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Site fidelity and homing behaviour in coral reef cardinalfishes
Author(s) -
Marnane M. J.
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
journal of fish biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.672
H-Index - 115
eISSN - 1095-8649
pISSN - 0022-1112
DOI - 10.1111/j.1095-8649.2000.tb02234.x
Subject(s) - biology , reef , homing (biology) , coral reef , ecology , predation , fishery , coral reef fish
Tagged adult cardinalfishes Apogon doederlini , Cheilodipterus artus and Cheilodipterus quinquilineatus persisted to within an average of 36–79 cm of their initial resting positions within One Tree Reef lagoon for over 8 months in A. doederlini and over 16 months in C. artus and C. quinquilineatus . In addition, 56–81% of tagged fish displaced c. 1 km, and 33–63% of tagged fish displaced c. 2 km returned to their point of collection within 3 days. As cardinalfishes are often found densely aggregated at resting sites, their extended use of specific sites on reefs may represent a localized, predictable resource for predators and a significant source of spatial variation in nutrient input to reef systems via faeces.