Growth, mortality and yield-per-recruit of the rabbit fish, siganus rjvula tus, from the eastern side of the gulf of suez, sinai coast, red sea

Length-based methods were used to study the growth of the rabbit fish Siganus rivulatus, in the eastern side of the Gulf of Suez. A total of 600 specimens were collected from the small-scale artisnal fishery landed in Al-Tur region during the period from March 2000 to February 2001. Length frequency distributions were analyzed and normal components were discriminated. The estimated von Bertalanffy growth parameters were L« = 29.409 cm, K = 0.735 y-1 and .to - - 0.22 y. The growth performance index (G>) was 2.803. The instantaneous total, natural and fishing mortality coefficients were 3.15, 1.431 and 1.72 respectively! The Beverton and Holt (1966) yield-per-recmit model was conducted in order to evaluate the status of the fishery. The results indicated that the Siganus rivulatus resource in the Gulf of Suez is slightly overexploited (E = 0.55).