How to tag a jellyfish? A methodological review and guidelines to successful jellyfish tagging

Sabrina Fossette, Kakani Katija, Jeremy A. Goldbogen, Steven Bograd, Wyatt Patry, Michael J. Howard, Thomas Knowles, Steven H. D. Haddock, Loryn Bedell, Elliott L. Hazen, Bruce H. Robison, T. Aran Mooney, K. Alex Shorter, Thomas Bastian, Adrian C. Gleiss

    Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

    10 Citations (Web of Science)

    Abstract

    Jellyfish have become a topic of interest of many marine scientists and managers alike due to their conspicuous socio-economic and environmental impacts. However, our knowledge about their "everyday life" remains limited. While electronic tags (transmitters and loggers) have been extensively used to study marine vertebrates for the past 50 years, tagging is still in its infancy for marine invertebrates and jellyfish in particular. Progress has been hampered by the difficulty and limited knowledge of attaching tags to soft-bodied animals. We argue that there is huge potential to use tagging to gather basic information on the ecology and behaviour of these species. Here, we give an overview of what has been learned so far by deploying tags on jellyfish, and why tagging is an appropriate method to study their behaviour and ecology. We then describe different tagging techniques, their advantages, disadvantages and challenges, and the steps to ensure future successful jellyfish tagging studies.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)1347-1363
    Number of pages17
    JournalJournal of Plankton Research
    Volume38
    Issue number6
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 15 Oct 2016

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