AGE STRUCTURE AND GROWTH CHARACTERISTICS OF CULTER ALBURNUS FROM DIANSHAN LAKE

Age structure and growth characteristics of Culter alburnus provide a theoretical basis for the artificial reproduction, sexual maturity age, survival rate to optimize the structure of fish stocks, the scientific use of its germplasm resources and to provide reference resource utilization and conservation of the species. To study the relationship between age structure and growth characteristics, a total of 452 Culter alburnus individuals were collected in the Dianshan Lake from May 2016 to July 2017. The results showed that the body length of Culter alburnus ranged from 15.32 to 77.91 cm, and that body weight ranged from 43 to 5567 g. There were no significant differences in body length and body weight between female and male (P>0.05). The relationship between body weight and body length was described by the linear equation:W=0.00002L^2.9211 (R²=0.9143, n=452), which is consistent with uniform growth characteristics. The growth pattern of Culter alburnus was described by the von Bertalanffy equation as L_t=99.651–e^{–0.1357(t+0.6287)}, W_t=11874.271–e^{–0.1357(t+0.6287)2.9211}, selection of scale identification age, measurement scale radius. The age of the fish ranged from one to six years with dominated ones with three year-old (55.71%), which revealed a growth trend of youth and miniaturization. The inflection point of the growth curve occurred at 7.2711 years with a body length of 65.54 cm and weight of 3471.79 g.