Peters and Schmidt: Age and growth of larval and early juvenile Scomberomorus maculatus 
531 
tion at approximately the same time of day. A review of 
this approach is presented in Tanaka et al., 1981; Broth- 
ers and MacFarland, 1981; and Geffen, 1987. 
The age and growth data used in this paper came 
from two separate studies, one dealing primarily with 
larvae and small juveniles less than 100 mm SL, the 
other with larger young-of-the-year (YOY) juveniles. 
The primary objectives of this paper are to combine 
these studies to present a more comprehensive analy- 
sis of age and growth of larval and juvenile (7-353 
mm SL) Spanish mackerel and to validate the daily 
deposition of increments on their otoliths. 
Methods 
Collection and treatment of specimens 
Past studies attempting to describe the age, growth, 
and distribution of Spanish mackerel have resulted 
in the collection of a relatively small number of speci- 
mens over a limited size range (MacEachran et ah, 
1980; Collins and Stender, 1987; DeVries et ah, 1990). 
Because of the apparent difficulty in capturing Span- 
ish mackerel larvae and juveniles, we attempted to 
increase our sample size by pooling ancillary collec- 
tions of Spanish mackerel from unrelated studies 
when they became available. This allowed us to use 
a wide size range of specimens collected over an en- 
tire diel cycle. 
Most of the Spanish mackerel larvae and juveniles 
(7.4-353.8 mm SL) were collected with a 1 m x 2 m 
neuston net (2.0 mm mesh) from Breach Inlet bridge, 
near Charleston, SC, during the entire nighttime 
flood tide (Fig. 1). The sampling effort was designed 
by the South Carolina Department of Natural Re- 
sources (SCDNR) to capture larval gag that enter 
the estuaries during the spring of each year. Span- 
ish mackerel were obtained from samples that were 
taken during the month of June from 1986 through 
Figure 1 
Locations of nearshore ichthyoplankton stations sampled during 1988 and 1989 and location of Breach Inlet, off Charleston, 
SC, where sampling was done for this study. 
