Limburg, K.E., M.L. Pace, and K.K. Arend, 1999. Growth, Mortality, and Recruitment of Larval Morone spp. in Relation to Food Availability and Temperature in the Hudson River, SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry.

Reprinted with Permission from Fishery Bulletin (1999) 97(1): 80-91

Growth, Mortality, and Recruitment of Larval Morone spp. in Relation to Food Availability and Temperature in the Hudson River

Abstract
We measured age and growth of larval striped bass (Morone saxatilis) and white perch (M. americana) and tested whether growth and survival were enhanced In relation to a seasonal pulse ("bloom") of high zooplankton abundance. Growth rates were lowest before the zooplankton bloom and highest afterwards for both fish species. An index of recruitment potential (instantaneous growth rate, G, divided by Instantaneous mortality rate, Z) did not relate clearly to either water temperature or to zooplankton abundance in the case of striped bass but did relate to both factors for white perch. Retrospective analysis of hatch dates in recruited juvenile striped bass from the same year class Indicated that later, faster growing cohorts were underrepresented when compared to the larval cohort distribution, and that cohorts that co-occurred with high densities of the cladoceran zooplankton Bosmina freyi were over-represented, Comparison of these results with similar analyses from other systems suggests that biotic controls on year-class strength may predominate in estuarine systems where physical factors are relatively damped (Hudson) but may play relatively minor roles in those systems with high physical variability.

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Contact: Karin Limburg, SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry, One Forestry Way, 133 Illick Hall, Syracuse, NY 13210 
Key Words: White_perch, Basic_biology, Population_dynamics 
Product Type: Research, Basic_biology 
User Type: General