Don't Put a Fish out of Water: Developing Sampling Protocols to Integrate Fish into Wetland Management Decisions

Historically, Missouri’s public wetlands have primarily been managed for waterfowl, but they are also important for other wetland-dependent taxa such as fish. The ability to identify and monitor the variety of taxa using wetland areas is essential to comprehensive management for the full suite of wetland-dependent species. Our goal was to assess the efficiency and effectiveness of fish sampling methods to determine species richness in Missouri wetlands and calculate the effort needed to detect 50, 75, and 95% of the species present with each method. We evaluated four sampling methods including two passive methods (mini-fyke nets and minnow traps) and two active methods (dipnets and seines). We sampled 24 wetlands in three Missouri ecoregions during spring and summer 2015. We collected over 100,000 individual fish comprised of 52 species, including 5 Missouri Species of Conservation Concern. Our results suggest that mini-fyke nets caught the highest number of species and consistently detected 50, 75 and 95% of the species present with fewer samples than other methods. Results may be used to develop a standardized sampling protocol that would inform managers and could result in modified actions to benefit a broader range of wetland taxa while still achieving primary management objectives.