Fisheries Research Articles

Parasites as indicators of movement and population connectivity of a non-diadromous, tropical estuarine teleost: king threadfin Polydactylus macrochir

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

6-8-2012

Journal Title

Journal of Fish Biology

ISSN

Print: 0022-1112 Electronic: 1095-8649

Keywords

Australia, Bray–Curtis index, Biological tags, Fisheries management, Polynemidae, Population connectivity

Disciplines

Aquaculture and Fisheries | Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment | Laboratory and Basic Science Research | Marine Biology

Abstract

Temporal and spatial patterns in parasite assemblages were examined to evaluate the degree of movement and connectivity of post-recruitment life-history stages of a large, non-diadromous tropical estuarine teleost, king threadfin Polydactylus macrochir, collected from 18 locations across northern Australia. Ten parasites types (juvenile stages of two nematodes and seven cestodes, and adults of an acanthocephalan) were deemed to be suitable for use as biological tags, in that they were considered to have a long residence time in the fish, were relatively easy to find and were morphologically very different to each other which aided discrimination. Univariate and discriminant function analysis of these parasites revealed little difference in temporal replicates collected from five locations, suggesting that the parasite communities were stable over the timeframes explored. Univariate, discriminant function, and Bray–Curtis similarity analyses indicated significant spatial heterogeneity, with Bray–Curtis classification accuracies ranging from 55 to 100% for locations in north-western and northern Australia, 24 to 88% in the Gulf of Carpentaria, and 39 to 88% on the east coast of Queensland. Few differences were observed among locations separated byspecies.

Link to Full Text

Share

COinS
 

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1095-8649.2012.03335.x