More than 150 permit have been tagged in Belize, with only one
recapture. Unfortunately, the angler who caught the tagged fish
was so excited about catching a permit that he forgot to look at
and record the tag number!
Slowly but surely we are obtaining data on movement patterns of
permit, which will be used to revise management if necessary.
As with recreational fishing for permit, it will take long-term
persistence to unveil the findings of the tagging program. Rest
assured, it seems that permit guides and anglers are up to the
task. If you are not yet participating in Project Permit and want
to take part, please contact us for a tagging kit. If you are
traveling to a fishing lodge to fish for permit, ask them if they are
part of the tagging program. If so, tag away! If they’re not
involved already, please let us know and we will contact them to
get them involved.
We are now experimenting with small satellite tags for permit.
Thus far there has been limited success. In the two cases to
date, the tags unfortunately came off the permit after only a few
weeks. It appears that the tags were hit by barracuda (based on
the teeth marks on the tags), which may indicate the possibly
that the barracuda thought the tag trailing the fish was food.
The tags provided information on permit depth versus time of
day and tide. We have two more tags to test before we
determine if satellite tags are a valid avenue of research for
Project Permit.