Dramatic effect of pop-up satellite tags on eel swimming

The journey of the European eel to the spawning area in the Sargasso Sea is still a mystery. Several trials have been carried out to follow migrating eels with pop-up satellite tags (PSATs), without much success. As eels are very efficient swimmers, tags likely interfere with their high swimming eff...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Burgerhout, Erik, Manabe, Ryotaro, Brittijn, Sebastiaan A., Aoyama, Jun, Tsukamoto, Katsumi, van den Thillart, Guido E. E. J. M.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer-Verlag 2011
Materias:
Short Communication
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3121937/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21594613
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00114-011-0805-0
Descripción
Sumario:The journey of the European eel to the spawning area in the Sargasso Sea is still a mystery. Several trials have been carried out to follow migrating eels with pop-up satellite tags (PSATs), without much success. As eels are very efficient swimmers, tags likely interfere with their high swimming efficiency. Here we report a more than twofold increase in swimming cost caused by a regular small satellite tag. The impact was determined at a range of swimming speeds with and without tag in a 2-m swimming tunnel. These results help to explain why the previous use of PSATs to identify spawning sites in the Sargasso Sea was thus far unsuccessful.

Ejemplares similares