Aquaflor® (florfenicol) and Terramycin®200 for Fish (oxytetracycline) are approved medications in the United States for delivery with feed to control mortality in salmonids due to furunculosis associated with Aeromonas salmonicida. The purpose of this study was to...
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Captive coregonid brood stock management facilities at Jordan River National Fish Hatchery
Inventorying Great Lakes survey and life history information to facilitate coregonine science, conservation, and restoration
Population models are a critical tool for informing native fish conservation and the types of models that can be developed are determined by data availability. In the Great Lakes, the size of the ecosystems and the multi-organizational management approach means...
Building an adaptive tool for mapping habitat and species to support the Great Lakes coregonine conservation and restoration framework
Coregonines have declined substantially over the past century throughout the Great Lakes. A basin-wide framework, adopted by the Council of Lake Committees, has been developed to conserve and restore these ecologically and economically important native fishes. We are...
Identifying and characterizing coregonine spawning habitat in Lake Erie
During the fall of 2021 and 2022, Lake Whitefish egg deposition was assessed using egg mats and egg pumping along the southern shore of the central and eastern basins in Lake Erie. Sampling was conducted at 12 different locations with 111 individual sites sampled over...
Resolving taxonomy of the cisco (Coregonus) species complex in the Laurentian Great Lakes and Lake Nipigon
The manager endorsed Coregonine Restoration Framework (CRF) identified a need for reviewing and updating the taxonomy of ciscoes, and this task was assigned to the first of four science teams established in the Planning Phase of the CRF. The ‘Resolve cisco taxonomy’...
Implementation of Coregonine population viability analysis within the Coregonine restoration framework – Year 2
Implementation of a gap analysis: comparing historical and contemporary coregonine habitat use in the Great Lakes
Our Gap Analysis team has multiple proposals in progress related to implementation of our Gap Analysis methodology for Great Lakes coregonines. We are proud to report that we have completed our objectives related to this project proposal (Year 2, FY23, Appendix 1)....
How many cisco should be stocked, and at what life stage?
Historically, members of the coregonine complex (Coregonus spp.) were the most abundant and ecologically important fish species in the Great Lakes (especially the cisco C. artedi), but anthropogenic influences caused nearly all populations to collapse by the 1970s....
Production, fish health surveillance, and research at Northeast Region U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS) facilities to support restoration of sustainable coregonid populations in Lake Ontario
Historical habitat use by Coregonus artedi in Lake Michigan
With the global-scale loss of biodiversity, current restoration programs have been often required as part of conservation plans for species richness and ecosystem integrity. The restoration of pelagic-oriented cisco (Coregonus artedi) has been an interest of Lake...
Development of a genetic map for cisco and bloater
We constructed a linkage map for cisco (Coregonus artedi), an economically and culturally important fish in the Great Lakes and across North America, which previously lacked a high-density haploid linkage map. We used diploid and haploid cisco from northern Lake Huron...
Inventory and assessment of coregonine spawning locations in lakes Erie and Ontario, including connecting channels
This project involved two phases. First, to identify locations of key habitats for coregonines in lakes Erie and Ontario and their respective connecting channels, we conducted a literature review of historical spawning, nursery, and adult habitat sites where...
Are cisco and lake whitefish competitors in the Great Lakes? Implications for future reintroduction efforts
The overall objective of this project was to evaluate historical commercial gill net fishery data available for State of Michigan waters of Lakes Superior, Michigan, and Huron for evidence of potential negative interactions between Cisco Coregonus artedi and Lake...
Dedicated surveys to describe the distribution and abundance of a remnant cisco population in Green Bay
Contemporary spawning of cisco and lake whitefish is not known to occur in southern Green Bay but in recent years a small number (< 10 per year) of cisco adults have been recovered along the Door Peninsula, and lake whitefish larvae have been captured in drift...
Spatio-statistical modeling and field validation of coregonine spawning and nursery locations for the Great Lakes, including connecting channels and major tributaries
This research builds on the spawning habitat inventory work [GLRI: Inventory and assessment of coregonine spawning locations in lakes Erie and Ontario, including connecting channels] by using data gleaned from the previous study to develop descriptive and predictive...
Historical and contemporary genetic diversity of Coregonus species from Lake Michigan
Advancements in molecular biology methods have allowed researchers to analyze genetic variation in extinct or extirpated species where minuscule amounts of cellular material remain. Here for the first time, we have leveraged one of these methods -...
Historical habitat use by Coregonus artedi in the upper Great Lakes and critical embayments
The restoration of the once abundant cisco (Coregonus artedi) is a management interest across the Laurentian Great Lakes. To inform restoration, we describe historical distributions of cisco in the upper Great Lakes (i.e., Lakes Superior, Michigan, and Huron) by...
Building molecular tools for coregonine species identification
The larval phase of Coregonus spp. represent a bottleneck in year class strength that is not well understood in extant populations and could present an impediment for coregonine restoration efforts in the Great Lakes. The use of species-specific DNA sequences to...
Genetic diversity among Great Lakes cisco species: exploring taxonomic and population boundaries
Ciscoes (Coregonus artedi, hoyi, kiyi, zenithicus, and nigripinnis) once formed a diverse species flock in the Great Lakes. While several taxa appear to have been extirpated, those that remain are an important part of the Great Lakes food web. Deepwater forms (C....
How does ecological function correspond to morphology in Great Lakes coregonines?
Human activities have caused widespread biodiversity loss, particularly in freshwater systems. For example, historical fish assemblages of the deepwater habitats of the Laurentian Great Lakes were dominated by up to eight closely related taxa from the genus Coregonus....
Movements and habitat use of cisco along a nearshore-offshore gradient in northern Lake Huron
Historically, the Great Lakes supported large and diverse cisco populations until overfishing, establishment of invasive species, and habitat loss resulted in large-scale extirpation during the mid 19th century. Managers have prioritized recovery of cisco in Lake...
Kiyi reproductive phenology in Lake Superior
Kiyi historically occurred in Lakes Huron, Michigan, Ontario, and Superior. Today they occur in Lake Superior. Reestablishing Kiyi into lakes where it went extinct is a topic of discussion among Laurentian Great Lakes fishery managers. An impediment to re-introducing...
Quantifying a potential mechanism between ice cover and cisco recruitment success: what role does light play in cisco embryonic development and larval survival?
Over the past several decades, Coregonus recruitment has dwindled to unprecedented levels for unknown reasons. Coregonus species are fall spawners whose embryos incubate under ice throughout the winter and hatch in spring. Recent changes in ice cover coupled with poor...
Contemporary habitat selection and survival of cisco in Lake Erie
This project addressed impediments to the rehabilitation of Cisco (Coregonus artedi) in Lake Erie through the application of acoustic telemetry to develop novel data on habitat use and survival of experimentally stocked fish. We tagged Cisco at the Tunison Laboratory...
