Table l.--Mean lengths of 4-year-old chum salmon from Prince 

 William Sound commercial catch and spawning ground samples, 

 1952, 1953, and 1956 



1 



Table 2. --Age composition of 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old chum salmon in 

 Prince William Sound catch and spawning ground samples, 1952, 

 1953, and 1956 combined 



RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 



More than 10,000 age-length determinations 

 were made for chum salmon from the three 

 areas. Age class 6 has not been considered 

 in this paper because it occurs infrequently. 

 The greatest number found in our samples 

 amounted to 0,05 percent in the Kodiak Island 

 area. 



The most striking feature of the age-length 

 relationship was the great overlap in the length 

 distributions of fish in three age classes 



(fig. 2). Three- and five-year-old chum salmon 

 overlapped through almost half their ranges, 

 and 4-year-olds overlapped almost the entire 

 range of the other two age groups. It is clear 

 from figure 2 that length cannot be used as a 

 reliable guide to age, or vice versa, in Alaska 

 chum salmon. 



Since there was no dependable relation- 

 ship between length and age in any area, 

 they are treated separately in the discussions 

 of variability within seasons and between 

 areas. 



