determination of age and growth of the mudskipper periophthalmus waltoni koumans, 1955 (actinopterygii: perciformes) on the mudflats of qeshm island and bandar-abbas, iran

in order to determine the age structure, growth, and length-weight relationship of the mudskipper, periophthalmus waltoni, from coastal mudflats of qeshm island, soroo and bandar-pol, in hormuzgan province, iran, we collected 192 individuals in february 2007. age was determined using the second pectoral radial bone and year class was based on length-frequency distributions. growth was described by the von bertalanffy growth model. for bandar-pol mudskippers, = 141.51 mm, k = 0.46 year-1, and t0 = 0.79 year. for qeshm mudskippers, = 166.79 mm, k = 0.42 year-1, and t0 = 0.62 year. overall, males grew larger than females ( = 208 mm vs. 147 mm), while females grew faster (k = 0.41 vs. 0.19 year-1). the age when the theoretical length was 0 (t0) was 1.46 year for males and 0.88 for females. maximum age was estimated to be 4+ years.