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Age, Growth, And Mortality Of Black Drum, Pogonias Cromis, In The Chesapeake Bay Region, Cynthia M. Jones, Brian Wells

OES Faculty Publications

We used otolith ageing to describe the population dynamics of black drum, Pogonias cromis, collected over a three-year period from the Chesapeake Bay region's commercial and recreational fisheries. Black drum average age, total length, and weight were 26 years, 109.5 cm, and 22.1 kg respectively. The oldest fish was 59 years and fish older than 50 years were present in the catch from 1990 to 1992. Growth in length slowed by age 20, whereas growth in weight did not slow until age 45. A von Bertalanffy growth function was fitted to our data (L(infinity) = 117.3 cm, …