An Evaluation of marks on hardparts for age determination of Atlantic croaker, spot, sand seatrout, and silver seatrout

An evaluation of marks on scales, vertebrae, and otoliths for age determination of Atlantic croaker, spot, sand seatrout, and silver seatrout was performed. Otoliths showed the most potential for accurate age determina- tion of these species. Otolith radii and marks had high positive correlations with fish total lengths in all four species. Reasonable agreement was found between lengths at capture and backcalculated lengths based on otoliths, for all four sciaenids. Lyman E. Barger, Allyn G. Johnson. Includes bibliographical references (page 5).