Bonefish & Tarpon Conservation Research

Tarpon Latest Numbers:

• Program Duration: 2001 – 2008

• Tarpon PAT Tagged: 108

• PAT Tags Recovered: 36

• Locations: Florida, Texas, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Mexico, Trinidad (British West Indies), Costa Rica, Dominican Republic.

• Deepest Dive: 486ft (148m)

• Longest Distance:
What? Tarpon: 171 lbs
Where/To? Veracruz , Mexico to Timbalier Island , Louisiana
When? May 30, 2005 to September 7, 2005
How long? 98 Days
How far? 1181 miles (Least linear distance, 1900 km)

New Tarpon Tagging Program
There is little known about tarpon population and fishery dynamics, stock spatial distribution, spawning migrations or movements between fishing areas, despite the importance of this species as a premier game fish. In addition, information on the spatial ecology of tarpon is particularly sparse, and could help to fill important knowledge gaps for management. A lack of this kind of vital information hinders development of management practices to ensure sustainability of their fisheries.

In addition to our PAT tagging program (Satelite Tags)we are starting a new research program in South Florida using anchor tags to evaluate and quantify tarpon movements and aspects of population dynamics. (more)

PAT Tagging Program
In 2006 we tagged 20 tarpon with satellite Pop-up Archival Transmitter (PAT) tags, the most ever tagged in a single year since we started the program in 2001. The release of the 20 tags was spread over seven different geographic areas (i.e., Florida Keys, central Florida, Texas (2), Mexico (2), and Trinidad) - the greatest number of locations we tagged in a single year. (more)