Abstract. — Use of early life his- 

 tory stages offish in systematic and 

 ecological studies has increased in 

 recent years. It is now recognized 

 that eggs and larvae present a wide 

 array of characters suitable for sys- 

 tematic analysis that are largely 

 independent of adult characters. 

 Fisheries recruitment studies focus 

 on survival of eggs and larvae as 

 the most important factor influenc- 

 ing variations in population abun- 

 dance. A requisite to these studies 

 is detailed information on the ap- 

 pearance offish eggs and larvae in 

 order to identify them in plankton 

 samples. This paper reviews the 

 proportions offish species for which 

 at least illustrations of eggs and 

 larvae, sufficient to permit their 

 identification in plankton samples, 

 have been published worldwide 

 and by geographic region. Factors 

 which may influence differences in 

 proportion of identifiable eggs and 

 larvae by region are discussed. Fac- 

 tors considered important include 

 species diversity, a history of im- 

 portant commercial fisheries, re- 

 search emphasis, and interests of 

 individual scientists in various re- 

 gions. We conclude that although 

 eggs and larvae of most species can 

 now be identified in some regions 

 of the world, there are still gaps in 

 our knowledge that prevent realiz- 

 ing the full potential of ichthyo- 

 plankton studies in systematic and 

 fisheries research. Filling these 

 gaps will require continued tradi- 

 tional morphological research as 

 well as application of biochemical 

 genetic and rearing techniques. 



Status of early life history 

 descriptions of marine teleosts 



Arthur W. Kendall Jr. 

 Ann C. Matarese 



Alaska Fisheries Science Center, National Marine Fisheries Service. NOAA 

 7600 Sand Point Way NE. Seattle. Washington 98 1 1 5-0070 



Manuscript accepted 20 April 1994. 

 Fishery Bulletin 92:725-736. 



Fish eggs and larvae collected in 

 plankton samples are becoming in- 

 creasingly important to the study of 

 fisheries, oceanography, and sys- 

 tematics (e.g. Moser et al., 1984; 

 Rothschild, 1986). Accurate identi- 

 fication of early life history stages 

 of fish is a requisite for studies in 

 these fields. Several kinds of publi- 

 cations assist researchers in iden- 

 tifying fish eggs and larvae: 1 ) some 

 revisions of primarily oceanic 

 groups include descriptions of lar- 

 vae (e.g. ceratioids [Bertelsen, 

 1951], bregmacerotids [D'Ancona 

 and Cavinato, 1965], and scope- 

 larchids [Johnson, 1974]); 2) de- 

 tailed descriptions of the develop- 

 ment of a species based on reared 

 or plankton-caught individuals or 

 on a combination of both are com- 

 mon (e.g. Ahlstrom and Ball, 1954; 

 Potthoff et al., 1980; Ditty and 

 Shaw, 1992); and 3) descriptions of 

 several species of a genus or family 

 are also available (e.g. Ahlstrom et 

 al., 1976; Belyanina, 1984; Kendall 

 and Vinter, 1984; Baldwin, 1990). 



While these detailed accounts are 

 essential for systematic studies, 

 publications that describe species 

 by geographic region rather than by 

 systematic group are more useful 

 for identification of eggs and larvae 

 from plankton samples. Agassiz 

 (1882), Ehrenbaum (1905, 1909), 

 and D'Ancona et al. (1931-56) are 

 early examples of such publications, 

 and several others have been pub- 

 lished recently (e.g. Miller et al., 

 1979; Auer, 1982; Fahay, 1983; Leis 

 and Rennis, 1983; Wang, 1986; 



Okiyama, 1988; Leis and Trnski, 

 1989; Matarese et al., 1989; Olivar 

 and Fortuno, 1991). Besides assist- 

 ing researchers in identifying fish 

 eggs and larvae in plankton collec- 

 tions, these publications facilitate 

 evaluation of descriptive develop- 

 mental information available for 

 fishes of a particular region. 



In this paper we 1) evaluate the 

 degree to which descriptions of the 

 early life history stages of marine 

 fish are available on the basis of 

 recently published early life history 

 guides, 2) compare our current level 

 of knowledge of fish egg and larva 

 identification by geographic region 

 throughout the world, and 3) dis- 

 cuss potential reasons for regional 

 differences in our level of knowledge. 



Methods 



We collected information on the sta- 

 tus of early life history descriptions 

 primarily from recently published 

 guides on development of fishes in 

 marine waters of seven specific re- 

 gions of the world (Fig. 1): North- 

 east Atlantic (Russell, 1976); North- 

 west Atlantic (Mid-Atlantic Bight) 

 (Fahay, 1983; supplemented by 

 Fahay, 1993); Indo-Pacific (Leis and 

 Rennis, 1983; Leis and Trnski, 

 1989); Japan (Okiyama, 1988; sup- 

 plemented by Ozawa, 1986); Antar- 

 ctica (Kellerman, 1989); Northeast 

 Pacific (Matarese et al., 1989); and 

 Southeast Atlantic (Olivar and 

 Fortuno, 1991). We also used publi- 

 cations that summarized available 



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