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A minimally invasive technique to assess several life‐history characteristics of the endangered great hammerhead shark Sphyrna mokarran
Author(s) -
O'Connell C. P.,
Leurs G.
Publication year - 2016
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/jfb.12900
Subject(s) - biology , endangered species , fishery , life history , zoology , ecology , habitat
A dorsal‐fin photo‐identification technique paired with a non‐invasive parallel laser photogrammetry technique was used to non‐invasively identify individual Sphyrna mokarran over time. Based on the data collected over a duration of 59 days, 16 different S. mokarran (mean ± s.d . pre‐caudal length: 220·82 ± 13·66 cm; mean ± s.d . cephalofoil width: 71·38 ± 7·94 cm) were identified using dorsal‐fin photo‐identification, with a mean ± s.d . shark re‐sighting frequency of 4·05 ± 3·06 at‐sea days. The results illustrate a high S. mokarran sighting rate and therefore, the utilization of parallel laser photogrammetry and dorsal‐fin photo‐identification may be a plausible multi‐year approach to aid in non‐invasively determining the growth rate and inter‐annual site fidelity of these animals.