Maximum Ages of Groundfishes in Waters off Alaska and British Columbia and Considerations of Age Determination
Munk KM. 2001. Maximum Ages of Groundfishes in Waters off Alaska and British Columbia and Considerations of Age Determination. Alaska Fishery Research Bulletin. 8(1):12-21
The longevity in some groundfish species in the eastern North Pacific Ocean and Bering Sea is remarkable. Maximum ages of some species are relatively young: walleye pollock and lingcod are 28 and 25 years, respectively. Some Sebastes species are frequently aged to be over 100 years old, with some areas producing more than a few specimens aged 120–160 years old. The oldest fish recorded from Alaska, and possibly for all of the North Pacific, is a rougheye rockfish Sebastes aleutianus captured May 2000 in southeastern Alaska, visually aged from a sagittal otolith transverse section to be 205 years old. This paper consolidates and updates the maximum ages achieved by many groundfishes collected primarily during commercial and research harvest operations north of approximately 48°N latitude in the eastern North Pacific Ocean (Aleutians, Gulf of Alaska, nearshore and inshore waters of Alaska and British Columbia) and Bering Sea, and describes typical age-determination process and error which produced these age estimates
- Type
- Journal Article
- Authors
- Munk, K
- Units
- GLBA
- Keywords
- Bering Sea, Coastal/Marine Systems, Fish, Fishery Management, Groundfish, Gulf Of Alaska, Ichthyology, rockfish, Sebastes