Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History
Spatial structuring and segregation by sex and size is considered to be an intrinsic attribute of shark populations. These spatial patterns remain poorly understood, particularly for oceanic species such as blue shark (Prionace glauca), despite its importance for the management and conservation of t...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:4131881 2023-05-15T17:29:41+02:00 Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History Vandeperre, Frederic Aires-da-Silva, Alexandre Fontes, Jorge Santos, Marco Serrão Santos, Ricardo Afonso, Pedro 2014-08-13 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4131881 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25119716 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 en eng Public Library of Science http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25119716 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. CC-BY Research Article Text 2014 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 2014-08-24T00:49:34Z Spatial structuring and segregation by sex and size is considered to be an intrinsic attribute of shark populations. These spatial patterns remain poorly understood, particularly for oceanic species such as blue shark (Prionace glauca), despite its importance for the management and conservation of this highly migratory species. This study presents the results of a long-term electronic tagging experiment to investigate the migratory patterns of blue shark, to elucidate how these patterns change across its life history and to assess the existence of a nursery area in the central North Atlantic. Blue sharks belonging to different life stages (n = 34) were tracked for periods up to 952 days during which they moved extensively (up to an estimated 28.139 km), occupying large parts of the oceanic basin. Notwithstanding a large individual variability, there were pronounced differences in movements and space use across the species' life history. The study provides strong evidence for the existence of a discrete central North Atlantic nursery, where juveniles can reside for up to at least 2 years. In contrast with previously described nurseries of coastal and semi-pelagic sharks, this oceanic nursery is comparatively vast and open suggesting that shelter from predators is not its main function. Subsequently, male and female blue sharks spatially segregate. Females engage in seasonal latitudinal migrations until approaching maturity, when they undergo an ontogenic habitat shift towards tropical latitudes. In contrast, juvenile males generally expanded their range southward and apparently displayed a higher degree of behavioural polymorphism. These results provide important insights into the spatial ecology of pelagic sharks, with implications for the sustainable management of this heavily exploited shark, especially in the central North Atlantic where the presence of a nursery and the seasonal overlap and alternation of different life stages coincides with a high fishing mortality. Text North Atlantic PubMed Central (PMC) PLoS ONE 9 8 e103538 |
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Research Article Vandeperre, Frederic Aires-da-Silva, Alexandre Fontes, Jorge Santos, Marco Serrão Santos, Ricardo Afonso, Pedro Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
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Research Article |
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Spatial structuring and segregation by sex and size is considered to be an intrinsic attribute of shark populations. These spatial patterns remain poorly understood, particularly for oceanic species such as blue shark (Prionace glauca), despite its importance for the management and conservation of this highly migratory species. This study presents the results of a long-term electronic tagging experiment to investigate the migratory patterns of blue shark, to elucidate how these patterns change across its life history and to assess the existence of a nursery area in the central North Atlantic. Blue sharks belonging to different life stages (n = 34) were tracked for periods up to 952 days during which they moved extensively (up to an estimated 28.139 km), occupying large parts of the oceanic basin. Notwithstanding a large individual variability, there were pronounced differences in movements and space use across the species' life history. The study provides strong evidence for the existence of a discrete central North Atlantic nursery, where juveniles can reside for up to at least 2 years. In contrast with previously described nurseries of coastal and semi-pelagic sharks, this oceanic nursery is comparatively vast and open suggesting that shelter from predators is not its main function. Subsequently, male and female blue sharks spatially segregate. Females engage in seasonal latitudinal migrations until approaching maturity, when they undergo an ontogenic habitat shift towards tropical latitudes. In contrast, juvenile males generally expanded their range southward and apparently displayed a higher degree of behavioural polymorphism. These results provide important insights into the spatial ecology of pelagic sharks, with implications for the sustainable management of this heavily exploited shark, especially in the central North Atlantic where the presence of a nursery and the seasonal overlap and alternation of different life stages coincides with a high fishing mortality. |
format |
Text |
author |
Vandeperre, Frederic Aires-da-Silva, Alexandre Fontes, Jorge Santos, Marco Serrão Santos, Ricardo Afonso, Pedro |
author_facet |
Vandeperre, Frederic Aires-da-Silva, Alexandre Fontes, Jorge Santos, Marco Serrão Santos, Ricardo Afonso, Pedro |
author_sort |
Vandeperre, Frederic |
title |
Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
title_short |
Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
title_full |
Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
title_fullStr |
Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
title_full_unstemmed |
Movements of Blue Sharks (Prionace glauca) across Their Life History |
title_sort |
movements of blue sharks (prionace glauca) across their life history |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2014 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4131881 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25119716 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 |
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North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25119716 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 |
op_rights |
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0103538 |
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PLoS ONE |
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9 |
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8 |
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e103538 |
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