Acta Amazonica (Nov 2019)

Biometric relationships between body size and otolith size in 15 demersal marine fish species from the northern Brazilian coast

  • Rory Romero de Sena OLIVEIRA,
  • Marcelo Costa ANDRADE,
  • Fabiola Seabra MACHADO,
  • Élida Jesana Santana CUNHA,
  • Flaviane Souto de FREITAS,
  • Alex Garcia Cavalleiro de Macedo KLAUTAU,
  • Tommaso GIARRIZZO,
  • Ulrich SAINT-PAUL

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1590/1809-4392201900571
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 49, no. 4
pp. 299 – 306

Abstract

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ABSTRACT The relationships between fish size and sagitta otolith measurements were calculated for the first time for 15 species belonging to six families from the northern Brazilian coast. A total of 220 fish were sampled from the bycatch landed by the bottom-trawl industrial shrimp-fishing fleet between August and September 2016. All species had strong relationships between otolith measurements and fish total length with the coefficient of determination (r 2) ranging between 0.71 and 0.99. The variable most strongly related to fish total length was found to be the sagittal otolith length (OL) with 98% of the variability. These relationships are a useful tool to estimate length and mass of preyed fish from otoliths found in stomach contents of marine predators.

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