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OBAMA · 06-23-2009, 10:13 AM

Thanks to everyone that showed up last night, especially FishGuyDave's
team from Nova. Nice crowd with many well-known capts, commercial
and rec fisherman, NOAA fisheries scientists and UM oceanographers.
Dr. Dave started us off with an overview of the research being conducted
at his lab that ranged from fishing technology (Circle Hooks, gear studies, survival rates)
to fisheries biology (stingrays, ray and shark parasites, wahoo and sailfish tagging studies,
to name a few).

Amy's (GutGirl on this forum) presentation was AWESOME as she detailed
the tedious and difficult job of identifying digested stuff in the guts of
swordfish. I really liked her series of slides with what the textbook photos
of a healthy specimen looks like, photos of her digested specimen, and the key
feature she used to identify the fish or squid. These features included the size,
shape, and location of eyes, fins, barbs, spines, and the funnel cartilage
in squid. I know some of you who donated fish were very anxious to
see the results of her research. It was obvious to to anyone that was there
last night that Amy put in tons of hours and used local resources like Nancy Voss,
the world's squid expert, at UM to conduct a very thorough analysis of the donated guts.

She examined 130 sword guts from various sources and found on the
order of 20 different fish species in them; some of the fish were
small and the most abundant fish were the Atlantic Mackerel. Swords
ate mostly (based on weight) squid, about 3/4 of their diet. This result
is consistent with other studies. Amy also found shrimp in squid,
but not too many. There was a tendency for smaller swords to eat
more fish and for bigger fish to eat bigger prey. Stories of parrot
fish, fruit, trash, etc found in the guts of swords were told by the audience.
Amy and Dave brought a bunch of the very wild looking deep sea fish
specimens in jars for folks to examine up close.

THANKS AGAIN to all for making this a very informative evening, including Boston
Johnny's for rescheduling an event so that we could meet last night.
The next meeting will be in August; date and speaker TBA. cheers, O

06-23-2009, 10:13 AM	#2 (permalink)
OBAMA Hooked Up Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 277	Thanks to everyone that showed up last night, especially FishGuyDave's team from Nova. Nice crowd with many well-known capts, commercial and rec fisherman, NOAA fisheries scientists and UM oceanographers. Dr. Dave started us off with an overview of the research being conducted at his lab that ranged from fishing technology (Circle Hooks, gear studies, survival rates) to fisheries biology (stingrays, ray and shark parasites, wahoo and sailfish tagging studies, to name a few). Amy's (GutGirl on this forum) presentation was AWESOME as she detailed the tedious and difficult job of identifying digested stuff in the guts of swordfish. I really liked her series of slides with what the textbook photos of a healthy specimen looks like, photos of her digested specimen, and the key feature she used to identify the fish or squid. These features included the size, shape, and location of eyes, fins, barbs, spines, and the funnel cartilage in squid. I know some of you who donated fish were very anxious to see the results of her research. It was obvious to to anyone that was there last night that Amy put in tons of hours and used local resources like Nancy Voss, the world's squid expert, at UM to conduct a very thorough analysis of the donated guts. She examined 130 sword guts from various sources and found on the order of 20 different fish species in them; some of the fish were small and the most abundant fish were the Atlantic Mackerel. Swords ate mostly (based on weight) squid, about 3/4 of their diet. This result is consistent with other studies. Amy also found shrimp in squid, but not too many. There was a tendency for smaller swords to eat more fish and for bigger fish to eat bigger prey. Stories of parrot fish, fruit, trash, etc found in the guts of swords were told by the audience. Amy and Dave brought a bunch of the very wild looking deep sea fish specimens in jars for folks to examine up close. THANKS AGAIN to all for making this a very informative evening, including Boston Johnny's for rescheduling an event so that we could meet last night. The next meeting will be in August; date and speaker TBA. cheers, O __________________ You know, they say if you want a friend in Washington, get a dog. Remember that in the end, in some way we are all fishermen. Last edited by OBAMA; 06-23-2009 at 10:58 AM..