Effects of acoustic tag implantation on lake sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens: lack of evidence for changes in behavior

Animal Biotelemetry
By: , and 

Links

Abstract

An assumption of studies using acoustic telemetry is that surgical implantation of acoustic transmitters or tags does not alter behavior of tagged individuals. Evaluating the validity of this assumption can be difficult for large fish, such as adult sturgeons, not amenable to controlled laboratory experimentation. The purpose of this study was to determine if and when this assumption was valid for adult lake sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens tagged with large (34 g) acoustic transmitters and released into the St. Clair River during 2011–2014. The hypothesis that activity and reach-scale distributions of tagged and untagged lake sturgeon did not differ was tested by comparing movement frequencies, movement rates (speed-over-ground), and location-specific detection probabilities between newly-tagged lake sturgeon and presumably fully-recovered conspecifics tagged and released in prior years.

Study Area

Publication type Article
Publication Subtype Journal Article
Title Effects of acoustic tag implantation on lake sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens: lack of evidence for changes in behavior
Series title Animal Biotelemetry
DOI 10.1186/s40317-015-0085-0
Volume 3
Issue 44
Year Published 2015
Language English
Publisher BioMed Central
Contributing office(s) Great Lakes Science Center
Online Only (Y/N) N
Additional Online Files (Y/N) N
Google Analytic Metrics Metrics page
Additional publication details