Biometric characterization of the tilefish, Lopholatilus villarii Ribeiro, 1915 (Teleostei: Malacanthidae), off Northeast Brazil

Abstract

The tilefish, Lopholatilus villarü Ribeiro, 1915, is a commercially-ímportant demersal fish caught wíth bottom longlines and hand-bottom lines in the Southeast and South of Brazil, and composes 23.8% of the landíngs from hand-bottom linershíps at the ports of Rio de Janeiro/Niterói and Vitória. The objectíve of this paper is to present a morphometric and meristic characterizatíon of the tílefish for the Brazilian Northeast, as thís specíes has previously been described only in Southeast and Southern regíons, between Rio de Janeiro (Brazíl) and Uruguay. Thís analysís examíned 42 specimens caught by bottom longline from the R. V. Prof. Martins Filho of the Federal Uníversíty of Ceará. The catch area ranged from Rio Grande do Norte State to Sergipe State, between the end of the continental shelf and the continental slope, at depths from 80 to 450 meters. In this analysis, 27 males (64.29%) and 15 females (35.71%) were examined. The meristíc and morphometric relatíonshíps were withín the standard ones described by other authors for this species. No statístically sígnifícant differences in linear regressíons between males and females were observed. The relationship between weight (kg) and fork length (mm) were calculated for each sex: 1) whole females: W=2,4036x10^-7 LZ^2.559; 2) eviscerated females: W=2,2743x10^-7LZ^2.551; 3) whole males: W=2,7280x10^-9LZ^3.233; 4) eviscerated males: W=1,5479x10^-9L^3.293. For the meristic characterizatíon, greater frequencíes of specímens were: dorsal fins, VII + 15 (24 specimens);anal fins, I + 15 (24 specímens); pectoral fins, 17 rays (26 specímens); and ventral fins, I + 5 (41 specimens).