Allman and Grimes: Spawning, settlement, and growth of Lui/anus gnseus from \he West Florida sfielf 



401 



lar\'al duration to be 24 days (21 d + 3d correction) from 

 otoliths of wild juvenile fish collected off the Florida Keys. 

 Richards and Saksena ( 1980) recorded settlement for three 

 laboratory-reared gray snapper that were 26, 26, and 36 

 days old respectively. Thus, gray snapper appear to have a 

 planktonic duration similar to the majority of reef fish (i.e. 

 from 20 to 30 days [Victor, 1991]). 



There was no obvious difference in the age at settlement 

 among regions or years. For 1996 and 1997, the temporal 

 distribution of settlement was about the same in the north- 

 ern and southern parts of the west Florida shelf In 1997, 

 birth dates and corresponding settlement dates were re- 

 corded during the winter months for only the most south- 

 ern sampling region. Settlement date was marginally asso- 

 ciated with the new moon in 1997, possibly reflecting high 

 transport into seagrass meadows at that time. Shenker et 

 al. (1993) found a correlation between onshore transport 

 of settlement-stage Nassau grouper (Epinephelus striatus) 

 and the new moon. However. Smith ( 1995) found no signifi- 

 cant association with recruitment of gray snapper through 

 Sebastian Inlet, Florida, and lunar cycle. 



Conclusions 



This study established that there were differences in the 

 timing of spawning and settlement of gray snapper across 

 the West Florida shelf Juveniles collected from south- 

 west Florida indicated earlier spawning times than previ- 

 ously reported. Additional year-round sampling of juvenile 

 gray snapper would help to identify the influence of early 

 spawning events on recruitment. Further study of larval 

 transport and genetic markers could aid in the identifica- 

 tion of source populations. 



Acknowledgments 



We wish to thank Alan Collins for assistance in the col- 

 lection and staging of gonads, Gary Fitzhugh for provid- 

 ing guidance on otolith preparation and reading, William 

 Fable, Todd Bevis, and Andrew David for helping to collect 

 fish. This study was supported partially by a MARFIN 

 grant (no. NA57FF0055) awarded to Christopher Koenig 

 and Felicia Coleman of the Florida State University Insti- 

 tute for Fisheries Resource Ecology. Joseph Travis, Doug- 

 las DeVries, Kenyon Lindeman, and three anonymous 

 reviewers provided constructive comments on previous 

 versions of this manuscript. 



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