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An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea
Whale sharks, Rhincodon typus, are often perceived as solitary behemoths that live and feed in the open ocean. To the contrary, evidence is accumulating that they are gregarious and form seasonal aggregations in some coastal waters. One such aggregation occurs annually north of Cabo Catoche, off Isl...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Public Library of Science
2011
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3084747/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21559508 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018994 |
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author | de la Parra Venegas, Rafael Hueter, Robert González Cano, Jaime Tyminski, John Gregorio Remolina, José Maslanka, Mike Ormos, Andrea Weigt, Lee Carlson, Bruce Dove, Alistair |
author_facet | de la Parra Venegas, Rafael Hueter, Robert González Cano, Jaime Tyminski, John Gregorio Remolina, José Maslanka, Mike Ormos, Andrea Weigt, Lee Carlson, Bruce Dove, Alistair |
author_sort | de la Parra Venegas, Rafael |
collection | PubMed |
description | Whale sharks, Rhincodon typus, are often perceived as solitary behemoths that live and feed in the open ocean. To the contrary, evidence is accumulating that they are gregarious and form seasonal aggregations in some coastal waters. One such aggregation occurs annually north of Cabo Catoche, off Isla Holbox on the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico. Here we report a second, much denser aggregation of whale sharks (dubbed “the Afuera”) that occurs east of the tip of the Yucatán Peninsula in the Caribbean Sea. The 2009 Afuera event comprised the largest aggregation of whale sharks ever reported, with up to 420 whale sharks observed in a single aerial survey, all gathered in an elliptical patch of ocean approximately 18 km(2). Plankton studies indicated that the sharks were feeding on dense homogenous patches of fish eggs, which DNA barcoding analysis identified as belonging to little tunny, Euthynnus alletteratus. This contrasts with the annual Cabo Catoche aggregation nearby, where prey consists mostly of copepods and sergestid shrimp. Increased sightings at the Afuera coincide with decreased sightings at Cabo Catoche, and both groups have the same sex ratio, implying that the same animals are likely involved in both aggregations; tagging data support this idea. With two whale shark aggregation areas, high coastal productivity and a previously-unknown scombrid spawning ground, the northeastern Yucatán marine region is a critical habitat that deserves more concerted conservation efforts. |
format | Text |
id | pubmed-3084747 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2011 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-30847472011-05-10 An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea de la Parra Venegas, Rafael Hueter, Robert González Cano, Jaime Tyminski, John Gregorio Remolina, José Maslanka, Mike Ormos, Andrea Weigt, Lee Carlson, Bruce Dove, Alistair PLoS One Research Article Whale sharks, Rhincodon typus, are often perceived as solitary behemoths that live and feed in the open ocean. To the contrary, evidence is accumulating that they are gregarious and form seasonal aggregations in some coastal waters. One such aggregation occurs annually north of Cabo Catoche, off Isla Holbox on the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico. Here we report a second, much denser aggregation of whale sharks (dubbed “the Afuera”) that occurs east of the tip of the Yucatán Peninsula in the Caribbean Sea. The 2009 Afuera event comprised the largest aggregation of whale sharks ever reported, with up to 420 whale sharks observed in a single aerial survey, all gathered in an elliptical patch of ocean approximately 18 km(2). Plankton studies indicated that the sharks were feeding on dense homogenous patches of fish eggs, which DNA barcoding analysis identified as belonging to little tunny, Euthynnus alletteratus. This contrasts with the annual Cabo Catoche aggregation nearby, where prey consists mostly of copepods and sergestid shrimp. Increased sightings at the Afuera coincide with decreased sightings at Cabo Catoche, and both groups have the same sex ratio, implying that the same animals are likely involved in both aggregations; tagging data support this idea. With two whale shark aggregation areas, high coastal productivity and a previously-unknown scombrid spawning ground, the northeastern Yucatán marine region is a critical habitat that deserves more concerted conservation efforts. Public Library of Science 2011-04-29 /pmc/articles/PMC3084747/ /pubmed/21559508 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018994 Text en de la Parra Venegas et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article de la Parra Venegas, Rafael Hueter, Robert González Cano, Jaime Tyminski, John Gregorio Remolina, José Maslanka, Mike Ormos, Andrea Weigt, Lee Carlson, Bruce Dove, Alistair An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title | An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title_full | An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title_fullStr | An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title_full_unstemmed | An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title_short | An Unprecedented Aggregation of Whale Sharks, Rhincodon typus, in Mexican Coastal Waters of the Caribbean Sea |
title_sort | unprecedented aggregation of whale sharks, rhincodon typus, in mexican coastal waters of the caribbean sea |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3084747/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21559508 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018994 |
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