Puzzling parrotfishes: Radiocarbon age validation and updated longevity estimates for western Atlantic species in support of sustainable fisheries management.

For management efforts to succeed in Caribbean fisheries, local fishers must support and be willing to comply with fishing regulations. This is more likely when fishers are included in a stock assessment process that utilizes robust scientific evidence, collected in collaboration with fishers, to evaluate the health of fish stocks. Caribbean parrotfishes are important contributors to coral reef ecosystem health while also contributing to local fisheries.

Caribbean deepwater snappers: Application of the bomb radiocarbon age estimation validation in understanding aspects of ecology and life history.

Reef fishes have been utilized as food fish throughout the U.S. Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico waters for centuries, with increasing fishing effort in recent decades.

Illuminating otoliths: New insights for life history of Balistes triggerfishes.

Our understanding of fish life-history strategies is informed by key biological processes, such as growth, survival/mortality, recruitment and sexual maturation, used to characterize fish stocks (populations). Characterizing the life-history traits of fish populations requires the application of accurate age estimation for managed species. Grey triggerfish Balistes capriscus and queen triggerfish Balistes vetula are important reef-associated species for commercial and recreational fisheries in the Atlantic Ocean.

Queen triggerfish Balistes vetula: Validation of otolith-based age, growth, and longevity estimates via application of bomb radiocarbon.

Ensuring the accuracy of age estimation in fisheries science through validation is an essential step in managing species for long-term sustainable harvest. The current study used Δ14 C in direct validation of age estimation for queen triggerfish Balistes vetula and conclusively documented that triggerfish sagittal otoliths provide more accurate and precise age estimates relative to dorsal spines. Caribbean fish samples (n = 2045) ranged in size from 67-473 mm fork length (FL); 23 fish from waters of the southeastern U.

Mercury accumulation in reef fishes: a comparison among red grouper, scamp, and gag of the Atlantic southeastern US and evaluation of "grouper" consumption guidelines.

In fish consumption advisories pertaining to Hg, grouper species in the family Serranidae are often lumped together and labeled generically as Grouper. However, grouper species vary considerably in growth rate, maximum age, and maximum size. This study examined the variability of Hg concentrations and bioaccumulation rates (increase of Hg concentrations in relation to age) for populations of three long-lived, slow-growing, protogynous hermaphrodite grouper species, gag Mycteroperca microlepis, scamp M.

Radiocarbon in otoliths of tropical marine fishes: Reference Δ14C chronology for north Caribbean waters.

Reef fishes support important fisheries throughout the Caribbean, but a combination of factors in the tropics makes otolith microstructure difficult to interpret for age estimation. Therefore, validation of ageing methods, via application of Δ14C is a major research priority. Utilizing known-age otolith material from north Caribbean fishes, we determined that a distinct regional Δ14C chronology exists, differing from coral-based chronologies compiled for ageing validation from a wide-ranging area of the Atlantic and from an otolith-based chronology from the Gulf of Mexico.

Age and growth of grey triggerfish Balistes capriscus from trans-Atlantic populations.

Anthropogenic factors that negatively impact reef fishes can include changes in life-history patterns of fisheries-targeted species. Understanding these impacts on growth and population age structure is essential in the management of exploited populations of fishes. This is the first study to directly compare age and growth for a major fisheries species between east and west populations of a transatlantic reef fish.

Parallel body shape divergence in the Neotropical fish genus Rhoadsia (Teleostei: Characidae) along elevational gradients of the western slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes.

Neotropical mountain streams are important contributors of biological diversity. Two species of the characid genus Rhoadsia differing for an ecologically important morphological trait, body depth, have been described from mountain streams of the western slopes of the Andes in Ecuador. Rhoadsia altipinna is a deeper-bodied species reported from low elevations in southwestern Ecuador and northern Peru, and Rhoadsia minor is a more streamlined species that was described from high elevations (>1200 m) in the Esmeraldas drainage in northwestern Ecuador.

Mercury bioaccumulation in offshore reef fishes from waters of the Southeastern USA.

Mercury (Hg) concentrations and nitrogen (δN) and carbon (δC) stable isotopic ratios were measured to assess differences in Hg bioaccumulation in four predatory fish species (Mycteroperca microlepis, Lutjanus campechanus, Caulolatilus microps, and Serioli dumerili) of high commercial and recreational importance in Atlantic waters of the southeastern US. Positive relationships existed between Hg and length, weight, and age, for all species, strongest for M. microlepis and L.

Mercury bioaccumulation in an estuarine predator: Biotic factors, abiotic factors, and assessments of fish health.

Estuarine wetlands are major contributors to mercury (Hg) transformation into its more toxic form, methylmercury (MeHg). Although these complex habitats are important, estuarine Hg bioaccumulation is not well understood. The longnose gar Lepisosteus osseus (L.