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Fishery Bulletin 109(3) 
Fishing locations selected by the commercial fishermen for collections of vermilion snapper (Rhom- 
boplites aurorubens), red porgy ( Pagrus pagrus), and scamp (Mycteroperca phenax). General sampling 
locations overlapped among years (square=2005; triangle=2006; circle = 2007) and were primarily 
on the shelf-break. 
years, his catches were typical of catches for commer- 
cial snapper-grouper fishermen in this region (Stephen 
and Harris, 2010). 
Age and growth 
Vermilion snapper and scamp otoliths were embedded 
in epoxy resin, sectioned through the core (~0.7 mm) 
with a Buehler IsoMet low-speed saw (Buehler, Lake 
Bluff, IL), and mounted on glass slides. All red porgy 
otoliths were first read whole. Otoliths from fish older 
then 6+ years were also sectioned and read to ensure 
accurate determination of age. Increments, defined as 
one translucent and one opaque zone for all species, 
were counted independently by two readers. Readers 
had no prior knowledge of the length, weight, sex, or 
capture date for any fish. Readers counted increments 
on sectioned otoliths along the dorsal side of the sulcus 
acousticus, from the core to the outer edge of the otolith 
and qualitatively ranked the edge type and otolith qual- 
ity. For whole otoliths, increments were counted along 
a straight line midway between the posterodorsal dome 
and the most posterior point on the otolith. Edge types 
were categorized as either 1) an opaque zone on the 
otolith edge; 2) a narrow translucent zone on the otolith 
edge; 3) a medium translucent zone on the otolith edge; 
or 4) a wide translucent zone on the otolith edge. Edge 
type and increment count were used to assign an age to 
each fish. For otoliths with a medium or wide translucent 
zone (edge type 3 or 4) in fish captured after January 1 
but before the month of opaque zone formation (vermilion 
snapper = September [Zhao et al., 1997]; red porgy= June 
[Harris and McGovern, 1997]; scamp=April [Harris et 
al., 2002]), ages equaled the increment count plus one; 
for all other fish, the age equaled the increment count. 
For vermilion snapper and scamp otoliths, two read- 
ers independently counted the increments for all fish. 
Total agreement, agreement within one increment, and 
average percent error (APE) were calculated for both 
vermilion snapper and scamp readings. For both spe- 
cies, readers simultaneously re-examined otoliths when 
increment count or edge type did not agree. If readers 
could not agree on a count and edge type, that otolith 
was not used in analyses. For red porgy otoliths, the 
first reader aged all otoliths, and a second reader aged 
a subset (n = 100 otoliths). Because there was a 98% 
agreement within one year, all final readings were from 
the first reader. 
Age distributions for sublegal and legal size fish were 
compared by using a Kolmogorov-Smirnov two sample 
