Age, Growth, and Mortality of the European Hake Merluccius merluccius (Linnaeus, 1758) from El-Kala Coastline (the extreme North-East of Algeria)

Document Type : Original Article

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Abstract

The present study deals with the age composition, growth, and mortality of the European hake Merluccius merluccius from El-Kala coastline (extreme North-Eastern Algeria) during the period from April to July 2020. A total of 900 European hake (13 ≤ TL ≤ 43 cm, 15 ≤ TW ≤ 495 g) were examined, based on length-frequency data. The FISAT II software was used for different analyses, in addition to Von Bertalanffy's growth parameters ( L∞ = 44.08, k = 0.29 and to = -0.517) with a growth performance (φ') of 2.75. Total mortality (Z), natural mortality (M), and fishing mortality (F) of European hake from the El-kala coast were estimated at 1.53, 0.61, and 0.92, respectively. The exploitation rate (E = 0.60) indicated an over-exploitation of the European hake stock, which showed high fishing pressure on the hake population in the El-Kala coastline. This, in turn, was argumented for the need for the strict management of the hake fishery in the study area.

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