Early juvenile hotspots of Mugil cephalus in northwestern Pacific estuaries suggest a nursery role within seascapes

The value of nursery habitat for the flathead grey mullet Mugil cephalus has seldom been compared across adjacent marine/estuarine contexts. Quantitative seine sampling of early juvenile M. cephalus in a temperate southern Japan seascape (estuarine river mouth, estuarine lagoon, exposed beach and embayed beaches) revealed that the river mouth had the highest nursery value, followed by the lagoon, based on abundance and sequential occurrence. Fewer early juveniles were intermittently collected from beaches. These results imply that, for this mullet population, estuaries serve as primary nurseries, rather than adjacent marine habitats.