Journal Article
Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, vol. 78, iss. 7, pp. 943-957, 2021
Authors
Stephanie A. Liss, Katherine R. Znotinas, Shannon E. Blackburn, Eric S. Fischer, James S. Hughes, Ryan A. Harnish, Huidong Li, Zhiqun Daniel Deng
Abstract
Two laboratory studies evaluated small Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) (36–99 mm fork length (FL), 0.7%–26.7% tag burden) survival, tag retention, and growth (n = 539) and critical swimming speed (Ucrit; n = 241). Fish were implanted with a new active acoustic tag and compared with untagged controls at 12 and 17 °C. Across studies, no temperature differences were detected. All control fish survived. All tagged fish ≥58 mm FL survived and retained their tags. Regression models predicted ≥98.6% survival and retention for tagged fish ≥58.6 mm FL or ≥1.9 g (4.2% tag burden). No growth differences among treatments were identified. Spline regression analysis indicated Ucrit was similar for control and tagged fish that measured ≥57.3 mm FL. We recommend tagging salmon ≥59 mm FL or ≥1.9 g (≤4.2% tag burden), although the guideline should be confirmed in a field setting. Study results represent an important step towards using the new active tag in acoustic telemetry field studies that estimate short-term (30-day) survival of small salmonids.
