Significance of Egg and Larval Size to Recruitment Variability of Temperate Marine Fish

Abstract

Recruitment variability is commonly associated with fluctuations in abundance of marine fish populations. Previous studies have focussed on stock-specific correlative or mechanistic models or on comparisons of recruitment variations of several stocks or species. The purpose of this study is to determine whether recruitment variability of commercial marine fish populations is associated with either size or the duration of early life history stages. The analysis was performed with data from 86 stocks representing 21 species of commercial marine fish. Univariate analysis shows that neither egg size nor the length at hatch is significantly correlated with recruitment variability. The change in length during the larval phase, which is representative of the duration of the stage, is significantly positively correlated with recruitment variability. Multivariate analysis shows that recruitment variability increases with increasing length at metamorphosis but that recruitment variability is poorly associated with length at hatch. The degree of serial correlation is related to the relative duration of egg and larval stages. The results clearly indicate that recruitment variability is linked to characteristics of early life history stages.