fish movment

[tailwaters]

This is something I have contemplated for a while now and although I’ve done a little research on the topic, the answers still eludes me. As we all know most species of fish migrate in one form or another. Be it traveling great distances or just moving inshore / offshore depending on the season. My question has more to do with this inshore offshore movement of reef fish like grouper and snapper. Do they know where they are going? I’m not talking about just the movement from shallow to deep or deep to shallow. What I want to know is do these fish set out for a particular piece of structure vs just swimming around till they find something they like. Remember the vast majority of the ocean floor in our area has very little contour or “land marks” per say. They can’t see great distances underwater either. I also think about this as it relates to Cobia too. Do they just swim around until they find something or do they know exactly where they are going. Any piece of structure is basically like a fish city. Are their roads or dedicated routes these fish travel between each of them?

When inshore fishing these fish highways are pretty apparent and great places to target an assortment of fish. Finding them offshore will be much harder but if they do exist then the benefit could be worth the research.

Anyways just something that’s been on my mind. Let me know what you think because I don’t have a clue.

[Gulf Coast]

Lot and lot of money spent on this subject. Thats why there are tagging operations...tarpon. bonefish and cobia to name a few. I've never heard of a snapper/grouper tag ? SK and a few other may know. Mother nature may not want us to know

[silverking]

As Big Bend Gyrene has mentioned in multiple posts, the University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Coast Research Lab has a regular tagging program for cobia and they share data with other states. Positive snapper and grouper have been/are tagged as well by the scientists. Just don't know of any organized effort like cobia for rec. anglers.

Dr. Bob Shipp of the University of South Alabama is one of the leading experts on snapper and has done grouper work too. Former chair and current member of the Gulf Fisheries Management Council. Goggle his name and red snapper comes up to check out his research and findings. Red snapper do move around and adults orient to higher-relief structure. Part of the issue with turtle excluder devices and red snapper management focuses on juvenile fish being caught up in the nets off the TX coast before they can move offshore and spawn. Gag grouper also spend time as juveniles on the grass flats/creeks before moving offshore.

[big bend gyrene]

See where you're going on a number of points but some are going to likely prove tougher to find info on than others.

I say the above as MUCH of the tagging Silverking references (guessing vast majority) is via spaghetti tags / and NOT much more costly GPS tracking devices. Can patterns be picked up on where fish generally move to / from? Yes. And in nearshore cases more detailed "roads of travel" might be apparent but offshore strikes me as a different beast. I don't think one will easily be able to discern whether fish are traveling in patterns from one SPECIFIC piece of structure to another with patterned regularity without GPS tagging.

As for cobia, per earlier posts current research points to MULTIPLE yet distinct general patterns without a firm understanding yet on why some move distinctly east to west versus south to north in late spring. Making extremely detailed travel tougher to understand is that they absolutely DO cruise around in general areas, being drawn here and there by things such as bait schools, riding shotgun with rays and turtles, etc. Even in the shallow flats I've seen lots of cobia I would describe as cruising around without any apparent target in sight.

Last but not least, not even going to touch grouper with a 10 foot pole.. you want to scrounge around in the BBF archives, somewhere there's a post were folks got in a pretty spirited debate over whether grouper ever move much at all, and in much at all I'm talking more than a mile or so. Thought WWIII was going to break out before that thread died down.

[JCC]

i read an article on such a study of largemouth bass. After being moved from home, whether dock, grass, whatever, they would return right back to home.if so, fish can imprint and migrate to particular addresses.