Mojica et al.: Recruitment of A/bula vulpes 



667 



moved into the lagoon during the first several hours 

 of the flood tide and that there was no movement 

 into or out of the lagoon during the ebb tide. 



Although the leptocephali of Albula vulpes have 

 been found throughout the Caribbean from Brazil to 

 Bermuda and the southwestern Gulf of Mexico 

 (Smith, 1989), few previous studies have investigated 

 the larval biology of the species or their movement 

 from the pelagic realm to the shallow juvenile habi- 

 tat (e.g. Eldred, 1967; Thompson and Deegan, 1982). 

 This study presents data on the recruitment of meta- 

 morphic A. vulpes in the Bahamas as they move 

 from the deep pelagic Exuma Sound onto the shal- 

 low Great Bahama Bank near Lee Stocking Island 

 (LSI). Data collected over four consecutive 70-day 

 winter sampling seasons and one summer season 

 were used to evaluate the effects of various environ- 

 mental parameters that have been shown to influ- 

 ence recruitment of a variety of taxa (Shenker 

 et al., 1993; Thorrold et al., 1994, a and b). The 

 otoliths of 87 individuals that recruited during 

 the 1993-94 winter season were examined to 

 determine the presumed spawning (hatching) 

 dates and to estimate the larval duration of A. 

 vulpes in the Bahamas. 



Materials and methods 



Data collection 



Larval bonefish were collected with moored 

 channel nets suspended in two tidal passes on 

 the western edge of Exuma Sound, Bahamas, 

 immediately north of Lee Stocking Island (Fig. 

 1). Winter sampling was conducted from 17 

 December 1990 to 28 February 1991, 13 Decem- 

 ber 1991 to 26 February 1992, 12 December 



1992 to 25 February 1993, and 10 December 



1993 to 23 February 1994. Summer data were 

 collected from 25 June to 4 September 1992. 

 Station locations, net designs, and sampling 

 protocols are detailed in Shenker et al. (1993) 

 and Thorrold et al. ( 1994a). To summarize, each 

 of three stations (corresponding to stations 1, 

 2, and 3 in Shenker et al., 1993) were equipped 

 with both a surface net (mouth area=2 m wide 

 xl m deep) and a midwater net (2 mx2 m) which 

 fished the 2-4 m deep layer. Samples were re- 

 moved from the 3-mm mesh nets after dawn 

 and before dusk each day. In this study, we 

 pooled catches among all six nets. Because less 

 than 10% of the A. vulpes larvae were taken in 

 the day samples, our analysis focuses on only 

 the samples collected at night. 



Wind speed and direction data during the first, 

 third, and fourth winters, and the one summer were 

 collected hourly at a Campbell Scientific weather 

 station on LSI. During the second winter, the weather 

 station was inoperative and measurements were re- 

 corded twice daily with a hand-held anemometer. 

 After statistical analysis of a summer period when 

 hand-held anemometer and weather-station data 

 were recorded, it was determined that the hand-held 

 anemometer data were consistent with those of the 

 weather station (Thorrold et al., 1994b). No weather 

 data were available for the month of December dur- 

 ing the third winter or for the period from 1 through 

 10 January 1994. 



Current patterns were monitored with a General 

 Oceanics Mark II current meter moored on the shelf 

 edge at a depth of 10 meters (Fig. 1). Hourly current 

 data were recorded for one month during the first 



Figure 1 



Location of Lee Stocking Island, Bahamas, and channel-net 

 stations. 



