Abstract

Coastal pelagic fishes live in near-shore waters staying above the continental shelf. Anglers easily access these coastal waters so coastal pelagic fishes are important in both commercial and recreational fisheries, especially in South Florida. Understanding spawning patterns is important for managing fish stocks, as fishing may influence population size by being size-specific thus truncating age growth dynamics (Lowerre-Barbieri et al. 2011). The two coastal pelagic species evaluated during this research were blackfin tuna and little tunny. Blackfin tuna and little tunny belong to the family Scombridae, sharing similar physical characteristics of body shape and fast swimming ability, both blackfin tuna and little tunny are considered small tuna (Collette 2002). Spawning season of blackfin tuna caught off Miami, Florida has been determined by external gonadal observation as occurring between April to November with a May peak (Idyll and de Sylva 1963). In the Atlantic Ocean, little tunny have a range from tropical to subtropical latitudes and are found from the Mediterranean Sea to the Gulf of Mexico (Collette 2002), however no research has examined their spawning season in the western Atlantic Ocean.

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