Combining a partnership among researchers, commercial, recreational, and recreational-for-hire fishers with a cooperative tagging program to elucidate the life history and habitat utlization of select reef fish and coastal pelagic species in the Florida Keys.

Abstract

The project objectives are to develop a cooperative tagging program and provide data for stock assessment of black grouper, red grouper, mutton snapper, greater amberjack, and cobia in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary (FKNMS), Dry Tortugas and Marquesas; to ascertain movement and migration patterns for black grouper, red grouper, mutton snapper, greater amberjack, and cobia in and outside the FKNMS; to provide movement and migration data for cobia and greater amberjack between the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic; to collect biological samples (otoliths and gonads) for the purpose of obtaining life history information (age, reproductive status, fecundity, sex ratio, spawning frequency, size at sexual transition, and size/age at maturity for females and males) and to evaluate the inconsistency of minimum size catch limits and size at reproductive maturation for black grouper within the FKNMS; to estimate survivorship for black grouper, red grouper, mutton snapper, greater amberjack, and cobia caught in the commercial, recreational-for-hire, and recreational fisheries; to characterize essential reef fish habitat within the FKNMS, especially for black grouper; and to analyze the relationship between landscape features and black grouper.