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Variation in migratory history of Japanese eels, Anguilla japonica, collected in coastal waters of the Amakusa Islands, Japan, inferred from otolith Sr/Ca ratios

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An Erratum to this article was published on 29 May 2003

Abstract

In order to examine the variation in migratory history of the Japanese eel, Anguilla japonica, we measured otolith strontium (Sr) and calcium (Ca) concentrations by X-ray electron microprobe analysis in 5 yellow eels and 20 silver eels collected in the coastal waters of the Amakusa Islands during the spawning migration season. Three migratory types categorized as river eels, estuarine eels and sea eels were found. Estuarine eels were dominant (52%), sea eels were the second most abundant (28%), followed by river eels (20%). The low proportion of river eels from the spawning migration season suggested that the estuarine and sea eels that inhabit the nearby coastal areas might make a larger reproductive contribution to the next generation in this area, although similar analyses should be made over the wide-range geographic distribution of this species, to provide better estimates of the reproductive contributions by different migratory patterns of the population.

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Acknowledgements

We thank H. Harada and K. Tanaka of Amakusa town for providing the materials. We are also grateful to Dr. J. Aoyama for helping improve the manuscript and to Dr. H. Sato and M. Otsuki for assistance in analysis. M. Oya kindly helped us with various aspects of the study. This work was supported in part by Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (nos. 10460081, 08456094, 08041139 and 11691177) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan, by research program no. JSPS-RFTF 97L00901 from Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, by the Eel Research Foundation from Nobori-kai, and by the Research Foundation from Touwa shokuhin Shinkoukai.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ocean Research Institute, The University of Tokyo, 1-15-1 Minamidai, Tokyo 164-8639, Nakano, Japan

    A. Kotake, M. J. Miller & K. Tsukamoto

  2. Otsuchi Marine Research Center, Ocean Research Institute, The University of Tokyo, 2-106-1 Akahama, Iwate 028-1102, Otsuchi, Japan

    T. Arai

  3. Faculty of Fisheries, Kagoshima University, 4-50-20 Shimoarata, Kagoshima 890-0056, Japan

    T. Ozawa

  4. Amakusa Marine Biology Laboratory, Kyushu University, 2231 Tomioka, Reihoku, Kumamoto 863-2507, Amakusa, Japan

    S. Nojima

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  1. A. Kotake
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  2. T. Arai
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  3. T. Ozawa
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  4. S. Nojima
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  5. M. J. Miller
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  6. K. Tsukamoto
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to A. Kotake.

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Communicated by T. Ikeda, Hakodate

An erratum to this article is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00227-003-1136-2.

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Kotake, A., Arai, T., Ozawa, T. et al. Variation in migratory history of Japanese eels, Anguilla japonica, collected in coastal waters of the Amakusa Islands, Japan, inferred from otolith Sr/Ca ratios. Marine Biology 142, 849–854 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-003-1016-9

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