Myers, Jaelen, Sheaves, Marcus, and Barnett, Adam (2025) Summarising 40 years of gastric lavage studies to evaluate efficiency and survival in sharks and rays. Journal of Fish Biology. (In Press)

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Abstract

Traditionally, lethal stomach dissection has been used to study the diets of sharks and rays, but conservation and animal welfare concerns necessitate non-lethal alternatives, such as gastric lavage (stomach or gut flushing). In this study, we summarised gastric lavage studies on elasmobranchs to identify which species/groups it has been effective for, the difficulties encountered and if post-release survival has been evaluated. Secondly, we used a field study to (1) demonstrate how to perform gastric lavage on juvenile rays, (2) assess its effectiveness and (3) verify post-release survival using mark-recapture techniques. Only 23 published studies have used gastric lavage on either sharks or rays, indicating that this technique is still highly underutilised in ecological research. Effectiveness at obtaining stomach contents varied but often exceeded 50%, particularly for rays. Captivity studies provided greater evidence of survival than field studies, and only one field study assessed long-term survival using tag-recapture methods. In this field study, gastric lavage was highly effective for young juvenile rays, and recaptures verified survival for various periods after release. More research is needed to adapt gastric lavage across a wider range of species and sizes, especially larger sharks. Furthermore, incorporating approaches to validate survival following non-lethal handling procedures will be essential to ensure ethical compliance and optimal outcomes for research and conservation.

Item ID:	86427
Item Type:	Article (Research - C1)
ISSN:	1095-8649
Keywords:	shark, ray, gastric lavage, stomach content analysis, non-lethal sampling
Related URLs:	https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/86429/
Copyright Information:	© 2025 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium,provided the original work is properly cited.
Funders:	Holsworth Wildlife Research Endowment, Ecological Society of Australia
Research Data:	https://researchdata.jcu.edu.au/default/rdmp/record/view/f33afab06b4c11ef9c50897db45a2811
Date Deposited:	29 Jul 2025 04:07
FoR Codes:	31 BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES > 3103 Ecology > 310305 Marine and estuarine ecology (incl. marine ichthyology) @ 100%
SEO Codes:	28 EXPANDING KNOWLEDGE > 2801 Expanding knowledge > 280111 Expanding knowledge in the environmental sciences @ 100%
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