CalCOFI Reports, Vol. 11, 1967 - California Cooperative Oceanic ...

52CALIFORNIA COOPERATIVE OCEATVIC FISHERIES INVESTIGATIONSPostlarval stage. Comprehensive notes are givenon variations of the vertebral counts of the anchovyat postlarval through adult stages by Kubo (1961)and Hayasi (1961, 1962a). Major features in variationsof vertebral, and dorsal and anal fin ray countsof the postlarval anchovy are summarized as follows(Hayasi 1961) :1. The adult numbers of vertebrae (43-47), anddorsal and anal fin rays (13-17 and 15-20, respectively)are fixed by the time the fish reaches19 mm TL.2. On the basis of meristic variation, the fishspawned in the early half of the year can besegregated from those spawned in the later half.3. The meristic characters differ depending uponthe hatching place, but usually the actual differencesare too small to make the meristic variationpractically useful in segregating local groups.Kubo (1961) showed that many workers indicatedthat the mean vertebral counts are reversely correlatedwith temperature at hatching place (Figure 3).The postlarvae taken in the coastal waters havelarger body depth than those taken offshore (Nakaiet al. 1962).Juvenile through adult stages. Through a numberof investigations, it has been found that the vertebralcounts differ depending upon size of fish at the juvenilethrough immature stages but not at the adult.The locality of habitat is not as significant a sourceof the vertebral variation as size of fish or season ofsampling (Kubo 1961, Hayasi 1961).Systematic Fractions of PopulationThe wide space-time extent of spawning and shortlife span imply that the anchovy population comprisesfractions at various steps of differentiation. Hayasi(1961) defined two of such steps as follows :Local group: A local group is a fraction of a populationregarded to consist of fish inhabiting a generallocality, such as the Pacific waters along Honsyu.A local group includes several space-time groups.Space-time group : A space-time group consists of fishthat are spawned in a particular area during a particularseason of the year. Because the spawningactivities continue to some extent spatially and seasonally,if the amount is disregarded, a space-timegroup is referred to a group of fish spawned to suchan extent as in the western Pacific area of Honsyuduring spring months.The systematic fractions segregate most completelyat the spawning phase. Examination of the distributionsof eggs as well as several characters of commercialcatch indicates major local groups chiefly propagatingin four different localities : (1) between HyugaNada and Tosa Bay and (2) Kii Peninsula and BosoPeninsula in the Pacific waters, and (3) betweenwestern Kyusyu and western Honsyu and (4) WakasaBay and Toyama Bay in the Japan Sea. The stocksin the Set0 Inland Sea comprise immigrants fromHyuga Nada and Tosa Bay as well as the indigenousgroup. In addition to these major groups, there area number of minor local groups that may interminglewith each other and with the major groups. Theeggs and larvae of the group inhabiting the southernPacific region, major spawning area of which extendsbetween Hyuga Nada and Tosa Bay, are transported,especially in the early spring, to the middle Pacificregion, in which large egg stocks are observed in thewaters between Kii Peninsula and Boso Peninsula(Hayasi 1961, Asami 1962, Takao 1964).For each of the local groups, several space-timegroups are segregated. In the middle Pacific region,the spawning activity reaches to the highest peakduring March through June, and the second peakappears sometime in autumn. The landings of siraszbare the most numerous in spring and early summer,and the second peak of catch appears in autumn. Thus,there are two major time groups, spring and autumngroups. In the waters, the anchovy are observed atfour developmental stages; eggs by the spawningsurveys, and postlarvae, immatures and adults of twoage groups by the commercial fisheries. Examinationof the growth, morphological characters, stock sizes,and seasons of their appearance indicate the followingfeatures of life history of the local group inhabitingthe waters under discussion (Hayasi 1961, 1962b).Most of the anchovies in the Pacific waters alongHonsyu occur in the waters between Kii Peninsulaand Boso Peninsula. The eggs are chiefly produced bythe fish in their second year of life (I-age). Themortality rates at postlarval through adult stages didnot remarkably change for most of about ten yearclasses up to 1960. A portion of them moves into thecoastal area at postlarval, immature and adult stagesexcept the spawning cycles. A few eggs and larvaemay drift to the high sea along the Kurosio current.Most fish may die within two and half years afterbirth.The spring group mainly occurs in the outer coastalwaters, and intermingles with eggs and larvae thatimmigrated from the southern waters in spring. Afterjuvenile stage, many of the fish spawned in springenter into the bays during the warmer months of thefirst year of life. The autumn groups occur not onlyin the outer waters but in bays. They also appear inthe coastal waters in their first autumn, but theirstock size is smaller than that of the spring groups.These two time-groups are discriminated by bodylength, meristic characters and distribution at thestages just before sexual maturation, and then interminglewith each other (Hayasi 1961,1962b).The anchovy inhabiting the southern Pacific regionare closely related with those in the Set0 Inland Sea(Asami 1958 a, b, C, 1962, Takao 1964). The majorspawning season shifts from the outer coastal watersto the bays and inland sea during spring and summer,and then reversely during autumn and winter. Themajor fishing grounds of each spqce-time group arelocated in the waters near the spawning grounds. Mostfish leave the fishing grounds by one and half yearsafter birth. The fish having occurred in the springare liable to move toward the middle Pacific regionat the egg and larval stages, but most of the othergroups stay within the region under discussion.