All fishes of the Family Elopidae, primarily tarpon (Megalops atlanticus, pictured above) and ladyfish (Elops saurus).

The biomass estimate for this compartment was performed in the same manner as that of Sharks. Refer to that page for a detailed demonstration of the methodology.

1. There is a large difference between harvest and catch numbers for Elopidae fishes for various reasons (trophy-only status, unpalatability, etc). Therefore, biomass is estimated from total catch, and not harvest. Again, as explained in the Sharks page, this was based on the assumption that recreational harvest underutilizes the production of each species, and that the total catch is probably a better reflection of total biomass.

  Schmidt unpublished.

  Cantillo et al. 1995.

1. Since the harvested fish are typically trophy size fish, two different sizes were used to calculate harvest rates and biomass.

  FLDEP 1997,  Schmidt 1979.

  Jorgensen et al. 1991.

Annual production was determined in the above biomass estimation. Refer to Sharks in this network for elaboration on the methodology. Seasonal variation in this case reflects the difference in biomass estimates between seasons.

see Detritivorous Gastropods in this network for methods used to determine these values.

  Jorgensen et al. 1991,  McNeil and Lawton 1970,  Humphreys 1979,  Thayer et al. 1973.

Consumption is determined by using consumption to biomass ratios:

  Arreguin-Sanchez et al. 1993,  de la Cruz-Aguero et al. 1993,  Vega-Cendejas et al. 1993.

Egestion has been calculated using the other parameters : E=C-P-R

  FLDEP 1997.

These values were determined from the estimated harvest numbers in the Biomass Section. These numbers represent harvest exclusively.

  Schmidt unpublished,  FLDEP 1997.