Retention of plastic-tipped dart tags in African tigerfish Hydrocynus vittatus |
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| Authors: | FJ Jacobs OLF Weyl NS Libala GC O’Brien |
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| Institution: | 1. Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Divundu, Namibia;2. School of Life Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa;3. DST/NRF Research Chair in Inland Fisheries and Freshwater Ecology, South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity, Grahamstown, South Africa;4. School of Life Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa |
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| Abstract: | Estimates of tag retention and tagging-related mortality are essential for mark-recapture experiments. Mortality and tag loss were estimated from 15 tigerfish Hydrocynus vittatus marked using Hallmark model PDL plastic-tipped dart tags released into a 1 730 m2 pond at Kamutjonga Inland Fisheries Institute, Namibia, and inspected bi-monthly for the presence or absence of tags. No mortality was observed during the experiment. All marked fish had lost their tags after 10 months and 50% tag loss was estimated at 3.9 months. The high tag loss rate indicates that PDL plastic-tipped dart tags are not suitable for long-term studies on this species. |
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| Keywords: | capture-mark-recapture freshwater tagging tag retention Namibia |
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