Movement and Recapture of Yellow Perch Using Passive Integrated Transponder Tags in Lake Erie

Yellow perch populations in Lake Erie have been successfully sustained in four broad scale Management Unit‘s (MU) consisting of four states and a province.   Adult stocks are managed with individual harvest policies for each MU.  Although studies have conceptualized stocks at a finer scale, information on movement, spawning site fidelity, and stock mixing is deficient.  In 2013, we commenced a multi-year study to address these needs.  We tagged 6889 yellow perch during the spawning season with passive integrated transponders in three different locations.  Approximately 7.5 out of 29.5 million harvested perch were scanned resulting in 94 recaptures.  The average displacement rate for fish tagged in Ohio and recaptured in Ontario (N=28) was 1.16 km/day, whereas fish tagged and recaptured in Ontario moved 0.5 km/day. No fish tagged in Ontario in 2013 were recaptured in Ohio waters. The highest recapture rate (adjusted for number harvested and scanned) was found 50 km east of the Ohio tag site with an average displacement rate of 0.7 km/day.Yellow perch tagged during in Ohio MU3 were initially caught eastwardly in MU3, then later in MU2 as the fishing season progressed, but, the highest adjusted catches were generally near the tagging site.