Satellite tracking can yield wealth of information for researchers; Public can follow fish movements through a tracker
MOREHEAD CITY – It’s called Big Red, a 33-inch Red Drum swimming along the East Coast with a satellite tag affixed to its body. Ironically, Big Red’s nearly 3-foot length categorizes it in the smaller/younger adult category of Red Drum, but the information that it gives researchers is of no small significance.
Big Red is one of 33 Red Drum tagged this year by The Red Drum Satellite Tagging Project, a partnership between N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries and the North Carolina Marine & Estuary Foundation. The tracking information, which includes location and water temperature, may teach researchers more about Red Drum stock structure (potential mixing of northern and southern populations), spawning and offshore migrations, and habitat preferences.
“This information could fill data gaps useful for coast-wide stock assessments, such as adult offshore movements, and it could support conventional tagging migration data with more detailed information,” said Division Biologist Cara Kowalchyk.
The Division began the Red Drum Satellite Tagging Project in 2024 with a $30,000 grant from the foundation to test tagging and information retrieval. The foundation provided another $30,000 for the second year of the project in 2025.
This year, the Division tagged 19 Red Drum, and the foundation, working with charter guides, tagged 14 more. The tags can stay on the fish for up to a year, providing key insight into seasonal movements. Now the public can watch the fish movements through a Red Drum Satellite Tracker on the Foundation’s website.
“Red Drum are an iconic symbol of North Carolina’s coastal communities and a key driver of our state’s $4 billion saltwater fishing economy,” said the foundation’s Executive Director Chad Thomas. “This exciting new tool invites the public to engage directly with real-time science from the field — to see where these fish travel and to understand why protecting their habitat matters.”
What about Big Red? It was tagged on Sept. 3, 2025, near the Pungo River. Since then, it has traveled more than 3,000 miles, remaining in the ocean, swimming to waters off northern Florida, then traveling back to waters offshore of Hatteras Inlet. Big Red is currently the frontrunner for miles traveled among the 33 satellite tagged fish.
For more information about the Divison’s participation in the Red Drum Tagging Project, contact Cara Kowalchyk at Cara.Kowalchyk@deq.nc.gov or 252-948-3875.
For More Information
Contact: Patricia Smith
Phone: 252-515-5500