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The Coded Wire Tag (CWT) are used to tag fish, sometimes crustaceans, insects, gastropods, and many other animals. A Coded Wire Tag is a length of magnetized stainless steel wire 0.25 mm in diameter about the width of a human hair. Rows of numbers on each tag identify a group of fish or an individual animal. Coded Wire Tags are cut from a roll of wire by an injector that hypodermically implants them into the fish. The standard length of a tag is 1.1 mm. There are half-length tags (0.5 mm) used for very small fish. For tagging larger fish or improved magnetic detection, one and a half (1.6 mm) or double length (2.2 mm) tags may be used.

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The VI Alpha Tag is a small, fluorescent tag with an alphanumeric code designed to identify individual animals. VI Alpha Tags are implanted internally but remain externally visible for easy recovery. VI Alpha Tags are widely used for individual identification of amphibians as an alternative to toe clipping. Tag retention tends to be nearly 100%, although the visibility of the tags varies based on the pigmentation of the overlying skin. VI Alpha Tags are implanted using the VI Alpha Injector. Tags are loaded into the flat needle and ejected with an internal push rod.

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Pros:
-Coded wire tags can be very small (useful for very small animals) with an enormous code capacity.
-Its benign materials mean that lifelong retention should have minimal effect on the host.

Cons:
-They are non-transmitting.
-Reading the tag is invasive because the tag usually needs to be removed and the code read under a microscope.

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Pros:

-The retention rate is very high.
-Alphanumeric codes offer identification for individual animals tagged.

Cons:
-They may have low visibility, varying based on the pigmentation of the overlying skin.

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Pros:

-They may be the most versatile method because they are small, flexible and bio-compatible.
-They come in several colors to be seen the best depending on skin type and location, or for categorizing, including fluorescent, which are highly visible in ambient light and more-so under UV light.

Cons:
-They do not contain individualistic tags, or any extra identification of the animal.
-There are a few steps into making the tag and injecting it in the right place with proper timing, because it starts as a liquid and turns plastic-like.

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The Visible Implant Elastomer (VIE) Tags are colored tags used mostly on fish, along with other sea-life including crustaceans, cephalopods, gastropods, and sometimes reptiles, amphibians, small mammals, insects and other animals. The elastomer is injected as a liquid that cures into a pliable solid. The tags are implanted beneath clear or translucent tissue and remain externally visible.

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VIE:

A potential use is in earthworms, which are sought to be tracked due to their ecosystem services. While they are used successfully in reptiles, fish and salamanders without tag loss or movement, they have been showed to be highly unreliable in Anuran species (certain frogs) (Brannely, 2013). They have been used in salmon, in wild populations and also in captive ones just to assess their success in staying. Being placed in different locations on the smolts (adipose eye, lower jaw or both), over 90% stayed through 18 months, some started to disappear from the lower jaw after that but were still visible through UV if fluorescent.

CWT:

There are many examples of use of CWT's.
The Michigan Department of Natural Resources have a long-standing Coded Wire Tagging program. They have tagged over 15 million salmon with CWT since 1990 and recovered over 75,000 tags.

Fish managers in the Pacific Northwest rely on Coded Wire Tags to manage Coho and Chinook salmon. Over 2 billion juvenile fish have been tagged with Coded Wire Tags since the mid-1970's and over 10 million tags have been recovered. The Canadian and US Federal governments, state governments, and tribal governments throughout the region cooperate on this program. Among other uses, the data collected is essential for:

-Allocating Canadian and US total allowable catch
-Assessing compliance under the Pacific Salmon Treaty, calculating fisheries and stock specific statistics (i.e. exploitation rates, survival rates, maturation rates)
-Monitoring marine survival
-Assessing fishing impacts
-Forecasting pre-fishery ocean stock abundances and
-Evaluating the effectiveness of hatchery production and experimental programs.

Managers in the Great Lakes Region of North America are using Coded Wire Tags to evaluate hatchery programs for salmonids in this very complex freshwater system.

Fisheries and Oceans of Canada have used CWT for decades, using the tags on a lot of spawn and seeing the adult escapement and exploitation.

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Butt, K. and Lowe, C. (2018). A viable technique for tagging earthworms using visible implant elastomer. [ebook] Applied Soil Ecology. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S092913930600148X [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Brannely, L. (2013). Visual implant elastomer tags are an unreliable method of identification in adult anurans.. [pdf] Pittsburg. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260268218_Visual_implant_elastomer_tags_are_an_unreliable_method_of_identification_in_adult_anurans [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Daniel, Jeremy A.; Kevin A. Baker & Kevin R. Bonine. 2006. Retention Rates of Surface and Implantable Marking Methods in the Mediterranean House Gecko (Hemidactylus turcicus), with Notes on Capture Methods and Rates of Skin Shedding. Herpetological Review, 37(3), 319â€“321 [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Farwell, M., Diewert, R. and Kalnin, L. (1995). A Coded Wire Tag Assessment of Salmon River (Langley) Coho Salmon: 1994 Tag Application and 1995-1996 Spawner Enumeration. [ebook] Fisheries and Oceans Canada. Available at: http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/Library/246495.pdf [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Fitzgerald, J. and Sheehan, T. (2003). Visibility of Visual Implant Elastomer Tags in Atlantic Salmon Reared for Two Years in Marine Net-Pens. [ebook] North American Journal of Fisheries Management. Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1577/M02-138 [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].

Garcia, G. (2009). Marking techniques: what options are there?. [ebook] Available at: http://www.amphibianark.org/pdf/Marking%20techniques%20What%20options%20are%20there.pdf [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Johnson, G. (2014). A Method for Utilizing Recent Coded Wire Tag Recovery Data to Adjust FRAM Base Period Exploitation Rates. [ebook] Salmon Methodology Review. Available at: http://www.pcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/F2a_Att4_Chinook_FRAM_BPERAdjstmnt_NOV2014BB.pdf [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018].

Northwest Marine Technology, Inc. (2018). Fish Tags: Coded Wire Tag, VIE, VI Alpha - Northwest Marine Technology Inc.. [online] Available at: http://www.nmt.us/ [Accessed 1 Mar. 2018].