alfredi coincide with predictable manta aggregations at several known locations in tropical and subtropical waters associated with mating, cleaning, food availability, and currents –. Sighting records suggest preferential occupation of nearshore tropical waters with strong site affinity and limited movements, although horizontal excursions >500 km have been documented. The reef manta ray ( Manta alfredi) is a small, coastal mobulid (Family: Mobulidae) that exhibits typical K-selected life history traits including slow maturation rate, small, infrequent litters, and long lifespan. Yet, despite these efforts we remain remarkably ignorant of the movement patterns in many pelagic fishes, perhaps none more so than the myliobatoid (devil) rays. These studies have revealed a remarkable array of behaviors from ocean basin migrations to individual fish dive profiles as deep as 2,000 m. While researchers had traditionally lacked the ability to track large pelagic animals in situ, the development of electronic tag technology has provided a wealth of information on the movements of these animals. Adequate conservation actions for mantas require data on horizontal and vertical movements as population connectivity plays an important role in determining the spatial scale of significant human threats. Both manta ray species have life history characteristics that make populations particularly vulnerable to directed and by-catch fishing. The recent Appendix II listing by CITES of the genus Manta has focused attention on this enigmatic group of large pelagic rays and the human threats that have led to their vulnerable status. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Ĭompeting interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. National Science Foundation (OCE 0825148 to SRT and GBS). 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 credited.įunding: Financial support was provided in part by KAUST baseline research funds (to MLB), KAUST award numbers USA00002 and KSA 00011 (to SRT), and the U.S. Received: SeptemAccepted: JanuPublished: February 6, 2014Ĭopyright: © 2014 Braun et al. PLoS ONE 9(2):Įditor: Yan Ropert-Coudert, Institut Pluridisciplinaire Hubert Curien, France The behaviors in this study indicate manta rays provide a previously unknown link between the epi- and mesopelagic layers of an extremely oligotrophic marine environment and provide evidence of a third marine species that utilizes gliding to maximize movement efficiency.Ĭitation: Braun CD, Skomal GB, Thorrold SR, Berumen ML (2014) Diving Behavior of the Reef Manta Ray Links Coral Reefs with Adjacent Deep Pelagic Habitats. Mean vertical velocities calculated from high-resolution dive data (62 dives >150 m) from three individuals suggested that mantas may use gliding behavior during travel and that this behavior may prove more efficient than continuous horizontal swimming. Six of the seven individuals performed a cumulative 76 deep dives (>150 m) with one individual reaching 432 m, extending the known depth range of this coastal, reef-oriented species and confirming its role as an ecological link between epipelagic and mesopelagic habitats. Mantas frequented the upper 10 m during daylight hours and tended to occupy deeper water throughout the night.
Transmitted and archived data were obtained from seven tagged mantas over deployment periods of 102–188 days, including three recovered tags containing 2.6 million depth, temperature, and light level data points collected every 10 or 15 seconds.
We deployed pop-up satellite archival transmitting tags on nine reef manta rays, Manta alfredi, to determine diving behaviors and vertical habitat use. Recent successful efforts to increase protection for manta rays has highlighted the lack of basic ecological information, including vertical and horizontal movement patterns, available for these species.
0 kommentar(er)
