Effectiveness of Six Methods for Marking Juvenile Shortnose Sturgeons

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Abstract
The shortnose sturgeon (Acipenser brevirostrum), an endangered species, was the subject of a stock enhancement trial. Some standard methods of marking individuals for later identification as cultured fish appeared to be ineffective. Therefore, six marking techniques were tested on several groups of cultured juvenile shortnose sturgeons (mean total lengths, 115–500 mm) during 1989–1990. The methods evaluated were: (1) coded wire tags implanted in the snout cartilage, (2) dorsally implanted T-bar tags, (3) dorsally implanted dart tags, (4) abdominally implanted T-anchor tags, (5) abdominally implanted disk anchor tags, and (6) barbel clipping. After 2 years, 100% of the clipped barbels were partially or completely regenerated. Retention of coded wire tags was highly variable (70–100%) in trials of 62–410 d. Retention was greater for the T-anchor tag (92%) than for any of the other tag types. However, in most cases, tag incisions and wounds persisted for the duration of the experiment.

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