FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 84, NO. 3 



with gonad growth and ceases with depletion of the 

 protein pool. 



Male Pacific herring from Auke Bay build gonads 

 and use their fat reserves more rapidly than do 

 females. Testes may be near spawning condition in 

 November, but ovaries are not full sized until April. 

 Males may be ready or nearly ready to spawn in 

 November over the entire eastern Pacific Ocean, but 

 females delay spawning until local conditions of 

 temperature and food abundance are optimal for 

 larval growth. 



The exponents for total and eviscerated body 

 weights, as functions of BL, exceed 3.0 in Pacific 

 herring from Auke Bay, and probably in Atlantic 

 herring as well because of their similar morphology. 

 Weight of mature gonads also have a greater-than- 

 cubic relationship to BL in Auke Bay herring (the 

 exponent was 4.4 for testes; the exponent of 3.9 for 

 ovaries was within the range for ovaries in Atlan- 

 tic herring). 



The annual product (eviscerated body weight and 

 gonad weight) is constantly proportional to BL 

 through ages 2-6 and also through ages 8-12 in 

 Pacific herring from Auke Bay, but the proportion 

 is considerably lower in the 8-12 group. However, 

 despite the two levels of production relative to BL, 

 annual production corresponds more closely to BL 

 than to eviscerated weight. Annual production may 

 be lower relative to BL in the older group because 

 suitable foods for adults may not be abundant in the 

 Auke Bay vicinity. Most annual production in young 

 Auke Bay herring goes into growth of eviscerated 

 body weight. After age 6, production of sex prod- 

 ucts predominates, and by age 12, sex products com- 

 pose over 90% of annual production. 



Pacific herring probably develop genetic stocks 

 that are distinguished by locale, spawning time, and 

 cycles of gonad maturity and fat utilization in the 

 females. The stocks probably are distinguished also 

 by growth rate, age, or size at growth inflection and 

 by partitioning of annual product between eviscer- 

 ated body weight and gonads. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



I especially thank Elizabeth L. Hall, NMFS Auke 

 Bay Laboratory, for her exacting scale measure- 

 ments and painstaking preparation of specimens, 

 and H. Richard Carlson and Richard E. Haight, also 

 of the Auke Bay Laboratory, who obtained the her- 

 ring samples from the Auke Bay vicinity, sometimes 

 under severe weather conditions. My thanks to the 

 Alaska Department of Fish and Game for samples 

 from Carroll Inlet, Katlian Bay, and the eastern Ber- 



ing Sea, and to Petersburg Fisheries, Inc., for the 

 opportunity to collect specimens from the herring 

 fishery at Hood Bay. Helpful reviews of the manu- 

 script were provided by H. Richard Carlson, Robert 

 R. Simpson, and Bruce L. Wing of the Auke Bay 

 Laboratory. 



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