Post-release horizontal and vertical behavior and philopatry of deepwater longtail red snapper Etelis coruscans around a bank

Little is known about the behavior and migration of deep-sea snappers, as observation of their deep-sea habitats is difficult. Manual acoustic tracking of deepwater longtail red snappers Etelis coruscans was conducted at the Ojika Se Bank, in the waters around the Satsunan Islands, Japan, to investigate their post-release horizontal and vertical behavior. Eight individuals were tagged with transmitters equipped with depth sensors for tracking. At least six of these eight fish survived after release. The fish gradually dispersed from the Ojika Se Bank, and only one-third remained there 33–34 days after release. The fish that remained at the Ojika Se Bank moved horizontally by 2.2 ± 2.0 km daily, but remained near the top of the bank. The fish were distributed in the 168.8- to 288.8-m depth range, and moved vertically by up to 50.0 m between consecutive days. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the daily fine-scale horizontal and vertical movements of any species of deep-sea snapper.