Captain Colt Cook and angler Duncan Wright aboard Hook n Cook tagged and released a 20″ dolphin north of St. Croix in the southwestern portion of the Anegada Passage on August 3rd, 2020. On September 23rd, 2020, artisanal fishermen Alido Baez of Bayahibe, Dominican Republic, recaptured Hook n Cook’s fish aboard La Fiera, which had grown 5″. This is the 11th within-region Caribbean Sea conventional recovery and first from north of St. Croix to south of Saona Island, DR, spanning the entire USVI/PR continental shelf corridor to the southwestern edge of the Mona Passage. When combined with the other recoveries reported south of PR and DR since 2011, the average movement rate is 8.93 miles per day. In the image to the left the numbers represent days at liberty for 7 of the 11 recoveries. The only other recovery generated from the Anegada Passage was tagged and released aboard World Class Anglers by Captain Josh Slayton and was recaptured in the northwestern portion of the Mona Passage by Captain Matthew Bierley, showing that fish can move through the Mona Passage from the Caribbean Sea toward the Tropical Atlantic.
Straight-line distance between tag and recapture sites = 257.58 miles; Straight-line movement rate = 5.05 miles per day; Days at liberty = 51; Growth rate = .098″/day or .68″/week.