CHAO and MUSICK: LIFE HISTORY OF JUVENILE SCIAENID FISHES 



'Gear: G, gill net; P, pound net; PI, plankton net; Pu. push net; R, rotenone; S, seine; T, trawl; Tr, trammel net. 



2 Age-group: represents smallest group of young-of-the-year first taken from January on, other fishes (including overwintering young-of-the-year) are included in 

 age-group I. Parentheses indicate that the boundary of age-group and I is indistinguishable. 



and the present study), young-of-the-year spot 

 first entered the estuary in April (Table 1). In 

 upper Chesapeake Bay (Young 1953) and Dela- 

 ware River (Thomas 1971 ), young-of-the-year spot 

 probably do not appear until May (Table 1). The 

 smallest young-of-the-year spot from trawl 

 catches are about 15 to 20 mm TL in all areas 

 which indicates that the young-of-the-year spot in 



northern areas enter the estuary later than in 

 southern areas. When spot first enter estuaries, 

 gear selectivity (Table 1) affects the size ranges of 

 spot captured; beach seines usually catch only the 

 small specimens (Young 1953; Figure 9), but 

 pound nets (Pacheco 1957) and large otter trawls 

 (Music 1974) usually catch larger fishes. Offshore 

 movements of spot during the winter season are 



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