Abstract
Underestimation of reef fish space use may result in marine reserves that are too small to effectively buffer a portion of the stock from fishing mortality. Commonly used statistical home range models, such as minimum convex polygon (MCP) or 95% kernel density (95% KD) methods, require the exclusion of individuals who move beyond the bounds of the tracking study. Spatially explicit individual-based models of fish home range movements parameterized from multiple years of acoustic tracking data were developed for three exploited coral reef fishes (red grouper Epinephelus morio, black grouper Mycteroperca bonaci, and mutton snapper Lutjanus analis) in Dry Tortugas, Florida. Movements were characterized as a combination of probability of movement, distance moved, and turning angle. Simulations suggested that the limited temporal and geographic scope of most movement studies may underestimate home range size, especially for fish with home range centers near the edges of the array. Simulations provided useful upper bounds for home range size (red grouper: 2.28 ± 0.81 km2 MCP, 3.60 ± 0.89 km2 KD; black grouper: 2.06 ± 0.84 km2 MCP, 3.93 ± 1.22 km2 KD; mutton snapper: 7.72 ± 2.23 km2 MCP, 6.16 ± 1.11 km2 KD). Simulations also suggested that MCP home ranges are more robust to artifacts of passive array acoustic detection patterns than 95% KD methods.
Highlights
Many terrestrial and marine vertebrates use specific areas for their movements [1, 2]
Accurate estimates of home range size are crucial to the design of efficient no-take marine reserve (NTMR) (e.g., [11,12,13,14,15]); an NTMR smaller than the home range size of a fish will afford it little protection from fishing pressure
The most commonly used methods are the minimum convex polygon method (MCP [16]), which defines the boundaries of space use and the kernel density model (KD [17]), which calculates spatial utilization probabilities
Summary
Many terrestrial and marine vertebrates use specific areas for their movements [1, 2]. We developed a spatially explicit individualbased simulation model of coral reef fish movements within a home range, using simple inputs of move frequency, move distance, and move direction relative to home range center. These inputs were parameterized from acoustic telemetry data for groupers and snappers acquired from a broad-scale, long-term study of reef fish movements and habitat use in Dry Tortugas, Florida [10]. Using simple behavioral rules to replicate observed spatial detection frequency patterns, we explored potential biases and errors in commonly used home range estimation methods emerging from constraints on sample size, scope of the acoustic array, duration of tracking, and number of movements detected. We developed upper bounds for space use estimates for groupers and snappers, accounting for movements beyond the scope and duration of the acoustic tracking program
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