Morphometric Characters of Sharpsnout Seabream (Diplodus puntazzo) Population in the Black Sea

Abstract

Sharpsnout seabream (Diplodus puntazzo) is a native species that spreads in all coastal regions of Turkey and is an important fish species for commercial purposes. In this study, the morphological characteristics of sharpsnout seabream fishes in the Black Sea Region have been detailed for the first time in the literature. In this study, 75 samples were examined by using representative sampling method in different size classes, and 14 different morphometric characters were measured. The findings obtained in this study showed that all morphometric characters were higher in males than females. Different morphometric characters were calculated as the percentage of total length (TL%), and the variance coefficient was determined by statistical methods. The most variable feature was the eye diameter (ED) in females and the highest body depth (HBD) in males. The findings showed that the total length (TL) had the strongest association with standard length (SL) in females, and it had the weakest association with pre-dorsal length (PrDL) in females. It was observed that there was negative allometric growth for female and male individuals. Given the correlation values between total length and weight, the findings demonstrated that the relationship was quite high for both female and male individuals.