Abstract

The shallow brackish water stream of Salt River is home to at least a dozen species of fishes. The stream is a habitat for juvenile fishes, which use it as a nursery until they are large enough to effectively evade predators. The sheltered mangroves, muddy bottom, mild surface currents and interspersed seagrass beds of the stream provide the perfect nursery habitat. Many of these fishes are zoo benthivores, feeding on the copepods, ostracods and nematodes, along with other species of microcrustacean that exist in the sediment and chironomids. Four species of mojarras predominate the stream, Eucinostomus argenteus (Baird & Girard, 1855), Diapterus auratus (Ranzani, 1842), Gerres cinereus (Walbaum 1792), and Diapterus rhombeus (Cuvier, 1829). While the Family Sciaenidae, commonly known as drums or croakers, dominate the shallow bay. They are represented by Bairdiella ronchus (Cuvier 1830) which feed on a variety of items including amphipods and Sargassum. In addition, are piscivorous fishes such as the needlefish (Belonidae), barracudas (Sphyraena) and snappers (Lutjanidae) which feed near the mouth of the channel and the nearshore. These consume small fish such as anchovies which are abundant in the bay. This site within the Portland Bight Protected Area likely feeds into the offshore fisheries and the larger fishing area off the south coast. This study uses catch data and stomach content analyses to determine the diversity of the fish assemblage at the different trophic levels in the Salt River ecosystem.