Habitat- and sex-specific life history patterns of yellow tang Zebrasoma flavescens in Hawaii, USA

Abstract

Yellow tang Zebrasoma flavescens is the primary coral reef fish species taken in Hawaii for the aquarium trade. As part of an extensive adaptive management effort that included a network of marine protected areas that prohibited commercial aquarium fishing, an emphasis was placed on obtaining habitat-and sex-specific life history information for this valuable species. Using otolith and capture-mark-recapture methods we examined sexual differences in ontogenetic patterns of habitat use, growth rate, size dimorphism and longevity. Age validation using tetracycline to mark otoliths provided evidence that a single annulus formed each year. Yellow tang are a long-lived species (the oldest individual collected was 41 yr old) and display an asymptotic growth pattern typical of the family Acanthuridae. Median size and age at the transition between deeper coral-rich and shallow turfdominated habitat use were about 20 mm longer and about 2 yr older for males than females and coincided with an increase in reproductive output. The sexual difference in size at habitat transition, combined with sexual size dimorphism (mean asymptotic maximum length -male: 179 mm; female 156 mm) results in differences in the size distributions of both sexes in the 2 habitats. Sexual size dimorphism resulted from a higher growth rate for males through the juvenile period.KEY WORDS: Ontogenetic habitat use · Hawaiian aquarium fishery · Acanthuridae · Model selection · Otolith · Capture-mark-recapture · Growth · Coral reef fish Resale or republication not permitted without written consent of the publisherMar Ecol Prog Ser 389: [245][246][247][248][249][250][251][252][253][254][255] 2009 information is combined with ontogenetic patterns of habitat use. Most studies on ontogenetic variation of habitat use have compared size distributions between habitats (Gillanders et al. 2003), and therefore have not considered age structure, sex-specific habitat use patterns or the duration of the lifespan spent in each habitat. When available, information about age-based habitat use can improve conservation planning and design of MPAs (Mumby 2006, Parnell et al. 2006) and lead to an understanding of how the amount of available juvenile and adult habitat may influence population size -a potential key to conservation and area-based fisheries management (Halpern et al. 2005).Many species of coral reef fish, including several species of surgeonfish, make ontogenetic shifts in habitat use-an important factor in the organization of fish communities (Robertson 1988, Lawson et al. 1999, Lecchini & Galzin 2005, Robertson et al. 2005, Pratchett et al. 2008. Yellow tang in West Hawaii settle primarily into middepth (10 to 25 m) reef habitat with a high percentage of coral cover (hereafter deeper coral-rich habitat). At some as yet undetermined point in their lifespan, larger individuals shift to spending daytime foraging in adjacent, shallow, complex habitats (reef flats and boulders) characterized by a high percentage of exposed rock covered by turf algae (h...

Evaluating ontogenetic patterns of habitat use by reef fish in relation to the effectiveness of marine protected areas in West Hawaii

“…For example, deep aggregate coral-rich areas (high in P. compressa and P. lobata cover) and rubble substrates adjacent to shallow turf-rich boulder habitats at various depths (i.e., 0 to 40 m) were associated with most of our study species, further reinforcing prior findings that both deep and shallow near-shore habitats may provide key settlement habitat and foraging, sheltering, and spawning sites for reef fish populations in West Hawaii and elsewhere (Claisse et al, 2009b;Friedlander et al, 2007;Ortiz and Tissot, 2008).…”

“…Additionally, the prevalence of shifts in habitat use to areas with more available food resources (e.g., algae) among adult acanthurids has been shown to coincide with increased reproductive ability (Bushnell et al, 2010;Claisse et al, 2009b). In contrast, adult C. hawaiiensis were associated with deep coral-rich and mid-depth habitats.…”

Establishing species–habitat associations for 4 eteline snappers with the use of a baited stereo-video camera system

“…Wi th the hypothesis that the levels of bottomfi sh prey and current speed are greater over hard-high habitats than over other environments (Ralston et al, 1986;Haight et al, 1993a;Kelley et al, 2006), it could be inferred that Opakapaka, Kalekale, and Onaga move into this habitat type upon reaching sexual maturity to increase their foraging rates and maximize reproductive output and gamete dispersal. On coral reefs in Hawaii, the Yellow Tang (Zebrasoma fl avescens) has been found to shift into habitats with increased food resources when it reaches reproductive size to possibly improve its reproductive ability (Claisse et al, 2009). No actual bottomfi sh spawning events were recorded during our study.…”

Differences in demographic traits of four butterflyfish species between two reefs of the Great Barrier Reef separated by 1,200 km

“…Growth was modelled separately for each species from each location using the reparameterised equation of the von Bertalanffy Growth Function (rVBGF; Francis 1988) (e.g., Welsford and Lyle, 2005;Trip et al 2008Trip et al , 2011Claisse et al 2009). …”