Modelling growth of red endeavour prawns (Metapenaeus ensis) using new ELEFAN and Bayesian growth models

摘要: Growth information is essential in many fisheries stock assessments. In the Northern Prawn Fishery (NPF), growth has been studied for several major prawn species, including grooved tiger prawns (Penaeus semisulcatus), brown tiger prawns (P. esculentus), common banana prawn (P. merguiensis), red-legged banana prawns (P. indicus), and blue endeavour prawns (Metapenaeus endeavouri). The red endeavour prawn (M. ensis) is a relatively data-poor species and its growth has been studied only once (Park, 1999). The study was a very useful contribution to our knowledge of endeavour prawns in the NPF, but the estimated parameters in Park (1999) were considered “dubious” due to a lack of rigor in data handling and the applied modelling method.Recent requests to update the red endeavour assessment led to an investigation of previously unused data from a historical series of monthly prawn surveys carried out in the North-Western Gulf of Carpentaria between 1983 and 1985 for estimating growth. Extensive length frequency distribution data (LFD) were collected for all commercial prawn species, including red endeavour prawns. A commercial fishing vessel named “Maxim” was chartered for these surveys. Hence, the dataset was often referred to as the “Maxim surveys”. Data collected during the surveys have been previously used for tiger prawn assessments, as these two species are the mainstay of the revenue of the fishery. This historical dataset had not been utilized for modelling growth of endeavour prawns. In this report, this overlooked dataset was used to estimate growth of red endeavour prawns.