Brodziak and Macy: Growth of Loligo pealei 



221 



" - ; if-:- 



r^i 



1 50 200 



Age (days) 



Figure 4 



Growth curves for pooled-sex Loligo pealei in length (A) and in weight (B). 



during June-October and during November-May, re- 

 spectively. Overall, female growth in length and 

 weight and male growth in weight were more rapid 

 for June-October hatched squid. Male growth in 

 length was also more rapid at younger ages for squid 

 hatched during June-October than for squid hatched 

 during November-May. 



The selected growth curves indicated that L. pealei 

 growth was dependent upon maturity stage, sex, and 

 hatching season. Indeterminate-sex squid grew more 

 slowly than adults whereas males grew more rap- 

 idly than females. Further, squid hatched during 

 June-October grew more rapidly than squid hatched 

 during November-May. 



Discussion 



Growth rates obtained in this study were generally 

 higher than those reported in Hixon et al. (1981, 

 Tables 1 and 2) but were lower than those in studies 

 of cultured L. pealei. In particular, average monthly 

 growth rates for males reported in this study (26 mm/ 

 month and 21 g/month) were lower than those re- 

 ported by Hanlon et al. (1983) who found average 

 growth rates of 44 mm/month and 37 g/month in a 

 sample of 6 male L. pealei raiseu in a closed sea-wa- 

 ter system. Additionally, Hanlon et al. ( 1987 ) reported 

 an instantaneous daily growth rate of roughly 2% in 

 ML for 10 L. pealei raised in a closed sea-water sys- 



