Presence/Absence Analysis of Historical Data on the Strawberry Darter

The Strawberry Darter Etheostoma fragi was identified as a species of greatest conservation need in the Arkansas Wildlife Action Plan. The Strawberry Darter is endemic to the Strawberry River drainage and was recently elevated from the subspecies to the species level. Abundance and distribution of the Strawberry Darter has been studied, but the most recent survey occurred more than 16 years ago. A new survey is being initiated. We conducted a retrospective analysis to examine historical patterns in the temporal and spatial distributions of the Strawberry Darter. We acquired data from 35 studies covering a period of 46 years. Our analyses did not suggest a systematic decline in the occupancy rate of Strawberry Darter over the period examined. The mean±SD occupancy rate was generally higher in tributaries (0.81±0.10) than the main stem (0.25 ± 0.38). Occupancy rate monotonically declined from the upper reach (0.55±0.52) to the middle (0.21±0.40) and lower (0.07±0.17) reaches of the main stem of the Strawberry River. The results from this retrospective analysis provide a foundation for designing a new survey of the status and distribution of Strawberry Darter.