Evidence of Cobble Habitat Preference in Age-0 Winter Flounder, Pseudopleuronectes americanus

Juvenile winter flounder utilize a wide variety of habitats, including those that are structurally complex. We investigated the habitat preferences of age-0 winter flounder in sand and cobble of varying complexity in the laboratory. Fish were observed every half hour for six hours in tanks with four cobble treatments; bare sand, sand with low complexity cobble, sand with intermediate complexity cobble, and sand with high complexity cobble. Habitat preference was inferred when the proportion of observations in treatments were greater than what would be expected by chance based on availability. Results suggest age-0 winter flounder strongly prefer cobble to sand, particularly cobble of an intermediate complexity. This study serves as a first step in the investigation of the importance of cobble habitat to juvenile winter flounder. It is recommended that this hypothesis be field tested to further investigate the use of this habitat type by juvenile winter flounder.