Abstract
Ecological theory predicts that movement by riverine fishes at the population level is characterized by both stationary and mobile individuals together creating a leptokurtic distribution of movement distances. However, studies testing this theory typically ignore spatial heterogeneity in riverscapes, and the theory has not been tested using Alligator Gar (Atractosteus spatula), a species of growing interest among anglers and fisheries managers alike. We characterized movements and habitat associations of Alligator Gar in the Brazos River, Texas, at fine (every 2 h for 24 h) and coarse (every month for 16 months) spatiotemporal scales. We tested for the presence of leptokurtosis and relationships between movement distance, habitat dissimilarity, and time-at-large using multivariate and univariate statistical approaches. Dispersal by Alligator Gar revealed leptokurtosis at the coarse scale but not the fine scale. At the fine scale, mixed effects quantile regression revealed there was no relationship between habitat dissimilarity and dispersal distance, but dispersal was positively correlated with time. At the coarse scale, dispersal was positively correlated with increased habitat dissimilarity and time, but only for the most mobile individuals. Our work suggests that short-term movements by riverine Alligator Gar during warm seasons and at base flows increased with time but were unrelated to habitat, and long-term movements over an annual cycle during warm season flow pulses revealed highly mobile members of the population accessed distant and novel floodplain environments.
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The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
River access was graciously provided by private landowners along the Brazos and Navasota rivers, without whom we could not have conducted this research. We thank M. Claus, C. Cottar, F. Kappen, L. Elkins, N. Santee, L. Stevens, J. Wolff, and L. Yancy for field assistance. Fish collection, handling, and tagging protocols were approved by the Texas A&M University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (Animal Use Protocol 2021-0054 to JSP) and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (Scientific Collection Permit SPR-0218-068 to JSP). Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the US government.
Funding
This study was funded by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD; grant TX-T-211-R-1 to JSP) and the United States Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (HATCH Project 1017538 to JSP).
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by JKE, HCR, MRA, and JSP. The first draft of the manuscript was written by JKE and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Ellard, J.K., Roberts, H.C., Daugherty, D.J. et al. Scale-dependent tradeoffs between habitat and time in explaining Alligator Gar (Atractosteus spatula) movement. Environ Biol Fish (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10641-023-01473-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10641-023-01473-3