410 



Fishery Bulletin 101(2) 



ranging from 120 to 1060 mm and ages from to 16 years 

 provided von Bertalanffy parameters of L. = 114.1 cm, k - 

 0.14405, and /„ = 0.00315. However, these data should be 

 viewed with caution because no lAPE values nor valida- 

 tion of the annual nature exist for these estimates, and it 

 is likely that the older specimens had been under-aged by 

 four or more years (Simon '). 



/C values (an estimation of how quickly an animal grows 

 to LJ were similar for both sexes of winter skate. These 

 growth rates are commensurate with other skate species of 



^ Simon, J. 2001. Personal commun. Bedford Institute of 

 Oceanography, P.O. Box 1006, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada 

 B2Y 4A2. 



similar size, but slower than skate species of smaller size 

 (Table 3). The oldest ages obtained for the winter skate 

 were 19 and 18 years for males and females, respectively. 

 These data are in agreement with the assumption that 

 larger batoids, such as L. ocellata and R. pullopunctata 

 (Walmsley-Hart et al., 1999) are longer lived and grow 

 more slowly than smaller species, such as R. erinacea, 

 which has been aged to 8 years with a k value of 0.352 

 (Johnson, 1979; Waring, 1984). 



Accurate stock assessment data for skates is difficult to 

 collect in the northeast United States because species are 

 rarely differentiated in landings information (New England 

 Fishery Management Council'). Because of this lack of dif- 

 ferentiation of species in landings, fluctuations in stock size 



