Age and Growth of Fishes: Principles and Techniques

Preface

doi: https://doi.org/10.47886/9781934874486.fmatter

Estimating age structure of fish populations and growth of individuals is at the core of evaluating fish population demographics and dynamics. Obtaining high-quality age and growth information provides important insight not only on growth, but also on recruitment variability, year-class strength, and mortality. Thus, age and growth investigations are critical for providing information on the basic ecology of a species and guiding management and conservation actions. At first glance, age and growth investigations seem straightforward and commonplace; however, obtaining useful age and growth information is not a trivial process and fishery scientists regularly fail to fully capitalize on their efforts.