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The Royal Society, Biology Letters, 2(1), p. 172-175, 2005

DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2004.0290

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Scale analysis suggests frequent skipping of the second reproductive season in Atlantic herring

Journal article published in 2005 by Georg H. Engelhard ORCID, Mikko Heino ORCID
This paper is available in a repository.
This paper is available in a repository.

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Abstract

A common assumption in fish studies is that iteroparous fishes, once mature, normally reproduce in all consecutive seasons. An analysis of scales from Norwegian spring-spawning herring collected between 1935 and 1973 revealed a strong under-representation (47% of expected) of second-time spawners on the spawning grounds. This reduction is not satisfactorily explained by errors in scale-reading, suggesting that the second reproductive season is frequently skipped. Skipping a season may relate to trade-offs between growth, current and future reproduction, and survival, which are likely to be particularly strong for young adult herring.