Spatiotemporal distribution of anchovy early life stages in the eastern part of the Adriatic Sea in relation to some oceanographic features

Abstract

Abstract During the summer of 2013 two scientific surveys (northern, at the beginning of July and southern, at the end of July) were carried out along the eastern Adriatic Sea. In these surveys, ichthyoplankton samples of anchovy ( Engraulis encrasicolus , Linnaeus 1758) eggs and larvae were collected. In the whole investigated area, egg and larvae abundance varied from 2.61 to 1040.24 eggs m −2 (geometric mean ± CL: 25.43 ± 1.48 eggs m −2 ) and 2.73 larvae m −2 to 611.14 larvae m −2 (geometric mean ± CL: 17.07 ± 1.41 larvae m −2 ), respectively. Higher abundance of anchovy early life stages was noted in the northern part of the investigated area. The length of the collected specimens lay within the range of 2.39–3.68 mm and those individuals were less than 12 h old. Analysis of spatial and temporal distribution of collected anchovy early life stages indicated their higher abundance in areas of upwelling (four areas were distinguished on the eastern Adriatic side). Larger and older specimens were collected at the beginning of July in the northern part of Adriatic indicating that the anchovy population in the Adriatic tends to shift among its spawning centres in this area. In general, anchovy eggs were accompanied by its larvae ( r = 0.453, P < 0.05), while statistically significant negative correlation was obtained between egg abundance and temperature ( r = −0.380, P < 0.05) as well as sea depth ( r = −0.321, P < 0.05).