Length-weight relationships, condition factors and relative weight of five fish species of Bushehr waters, Northern Persian Gulf

Abstract

The aim of this study was to record the length-weight relationship parameters and condition factors for some commercially important fish of Bushehr coastal waters of Persian Gulf. The length-weight relationships were calculated for five species caught during fishing surveys using different types of fishing gears (trawls, pots and gill net with different mesh size) during April 2008 to December 2010. The b value ranged between 2.733 for Argyrops spinifer and 3.03 for Epinephelus coioides. The coefficient of determination (r2) was very significant for all the species. Relative weight had significant differences (Kruskal-Wallis test, P<0.001) with best performance by E. coioides. This results show that this range size of specimens in these populations apparently do not reach and surpass 100% of mean weight. In this study, length-weight relationships and condition factors are reported for the first time for A. spinifer, Pomadasys kaakan and Lutjanus malabaricus from the Persian Gulf and for Lethrinus nebulosus and Lutjanus malabaricus ruber which has not been previously recorded in the Iranian waters.

Key words: Length-weight relationships, condition factor, relative weight, Persian Gulf.