Age structure and growth of the rough scad, Trachurus lathami (Teleostei: Carangidae), in the Southeastern Brazilian Bight

Abstract

ABSTRACT. The rough scad, Trachurus lathami Nichols, 1920, is a small pelagic species distributed along the West Atlantic coast.It is most abundant in the Southern Brazil (28°30'-34°S) and in the Southeastern Brazilian Bight (SEBB, 22°-28°30'S). The rough scad is fished by purse seines, which main target is the Brazilian sardine, Sardinella brasiliensis (Steindachner, 1879). Age and growth are vital to understand the life cycle of a species, to fishery management and ecosystem modeling. This study aimed to assess the age and growth of T. lathami, to identify its age structure in the SEBB, and to evaluate what causes the wide differences among 1975 and 2008-2010, indicating that the otolith development, the growth pattern and the age structure remained stable. T. lathami is the smallest species of Trachurus and it has the highest growth rates among them. This is probably related to the different temperatures where larvae/juvenile and adult grow, to the absence of a strong fishing pressure and to decadal population variability.

Geographic Variation in Opisthonema oglinum (Lesueur, 1818) in the Southeastern Brazilian Bight Inferred from Otolith Shape and Chemical Signatures

“…The relative importance of these three species on purse seine landings varies according to the resource's availability, showing some inter-annual oscillations (Figure 1). This scenario has been previously documented for the Brazilian sardine purse seine fishery, notably in relation to Scomber japonicus and Trachurus lathami as alternative species [54][55][56][57], although in the last years, O. oglinum has become the main alternative species when sardines are scarce. In general, this is a common situation for all small pelagic fishes worldwide [27,29].…”

Ficha de Trachurus lathami

“…No Brasil, existem registros da espécie no Amapá, Pará, Maranhão, Pernambuco, Alagoas, Sergipe, Bahia, Espírito Santo, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Paraná, Santa Catarina e Rio Grande do Sul (Cergole et al, 2005;Netto & Di-Beneditto, 2007;Hatje & Andrade, 2009;Nunes et al, 2011;Monteiro-Neto et al, 2013;Freire & Araújo, 2016;Ruas & Vaz-dos-Santos, 2017;Pinheiro et al, 2018;Spier et al, 2018;Melo et al, 2019;Marceniuk et al, 2021).…”