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<DIV class="citation articleInformationHeader" id=publishedOnlineDate sizset="5"
sizcache="1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><STRONG>Journal of Fish
Biology</STRONG></DIV>
<DIV>Article first published online: 20 JUN 2011</DIV>
<DIV id=doi>DOI: 10.1111/j.1095-8649.2011.02999.x</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV>
<DIV class=articleTitle><FONT size=4>Identification of seagrasses in the gut of
a marine herbivorous fish using DNA barcoding and visual inspection
techniques</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class="citation articleInformationHeader" id=cr1 sizset="5" sizcache="1"
xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">A. Chelsky Budarf<SUP>1,2</SUP>, D. D.
Burfeind<SUP>1,2,*</SUP>, W. K. W. Loh<SUP>1,3</SUP>, I. R.
Tibbetts<SUP>1</SUP></DIV>
<DIV class="citation articleInformationHeader" id=publishedOnlineDate sizset="5"
sizcache="1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><SUP>1</SUP> School of
Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Brisbane, Qld 4072,
Australia<SUP>2</SUP> Australian Rivers Institute, Griffith University, Gold
Coast Campus, Qld 4222, Australia <SUP>3</SUP> Faculty of Humanities and Social
Sciences, Bond University, Gold Coast, Qld 4229, Australia<EM>.</EM>
Correspondence: D. D. Burfeind, +617 5552 9257; email: <!--TODO: clickthrough URL--><A title="Link to email address"
href="mailto:d.burfeind@griffith.edu.au" shape=rect><FONT
color=#007e8a>d.burfeind@griffith.edu.au</FONT></A></DIV>
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<DIV id=abstract>
<DIV class=para>
<P><STRONG>Abstract</STRONG></P>
<P>Traditional visual diet analysis techniques were compared with DNA barcoding
in juvenile herbivorous rabbitfish <EM>Siganus fuscescens</EM> collected in
Moreton Bay, Australia, where at least six species of seagrass occur. The
intergenic spacer <EM>trn</EM>H<EM>-psb</EM>A, suggested as the optimal gene for
barcoding angiosperms, was used for the first time to identify the seagrass in
fish guts. Four seagrass species and one alga were identified visually from gut
contents; however, there was considerable uncertainty in visual identification
with 38 of 40 fish having unidentifiable plant fragments in their gut. PCR and
single-strand conformational polymorphism (SSCP) were able to discriminate three
seagrass families from visually cryptic gut contents. While effective in
identifying cryptic gut content to family level, this novel method is likely to
be most efficient when paired with visual identification
techniques.</P></DIV></DIV></DIV></DIV></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>