Comeau and Savoie: Movement of Homaivs amencanus in the southwestern Gulf of St Lawrence 



183 



structions given for returninfi lobster tag information, and 

 the cooperation of the fishermen was sought (Comeau et 

 al., 1998). Similar information was posted at wharves. For 

 each tagged lobster, fishermen were asked to record date 

 of capture, tag number, position of capture, and depth. 

 They were then asked to freeze the animal with the tag 

 still attached and contact an information collection center, 

 where they could leave their names, addresses, and tele- 

 phone numbers. A DFO representative collected tagged 

 lobsters for measurement and reimbursed fishermen ac- 

 cording to the market value of the recovered lobsters. No 



reward was issued. Fishermen also had the option to bring 

 the lobsters and the information to a fisherman-represen- 

 tative. If a tagged lobster under the legal size or a tagged 

 berried female was captured, fishermen were asked to re- 

 cord the above information and release the lobster to the 

 water with the tag still attached. 



The distance traveled by each recaptured animal was 

 calculated as the linear distance between release and re- 

 capture positions. The Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney 

 (t/-test) tests were used to compare the average distance 

 traveled for males, females, and berried females for ani- 



Table 2 



Average distances traveled by American lobsters tagged in the southwestern Gulf of St. Lawrence between 1980 and 1997. The 

 number of each site corresponds to its geographical position on the map in Figure 1. n = number of recaptured lobster with tags 

 indicating release location for which distance traveled to recapture site could be calculated. 



