The Habitat, Movements, and Management of Dolphin, Coryphaena hippurus, in the Western North Atlantic, Caribbean, and Gulf of Mexico

• Main Authors: Edward R. Farrell, Dr. Patrick Halpin Advisor
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.497.1865; http://dukespace.lib.duke.edu/dspace/bitstream/handle/10161/969/Farrell_MP_Final.pdf;jsessionid=934EEDCF9A569B13AE953C9D4E530613?sequence=1

Dolphin, Coryphaena hippurus, is a highly migratory cosmopolitan pelagic fish that is found seasonally in the Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico, and along the Atlantic coast of the United States. Dolphin are considered as one unit stock throughout the study area. This study used release-recapture data from a long-term tagging project to investigate baseline environmental preferences, habitat suitability based on dynamic eco-geographical variables, spatio-temporal movement through marine cadastral zones, and related policy implications. The data was collected from hundreds of recreational fishermen that tagged dolphin and also recaptured dolphin. A combination of in situ observations from recreational taggers and remotely sampled physical and biological variables (depth, bathymetric slope, distance to shore, distance to continental shelf, sea surface temperature, and sea surface chlorophyll-a) were used to establish an updated and novel baseline of environmental characteristics. A presence-only spatially explicit multivariate modeling approach was used to reveal the bio-physical seasonal preferences of dolphin that define the ecological niche. The results of the models show strong spatial