Alaska crustacean age determination study: methods development and band count estimates of gastric mill structures and eyestalks for red king crab, snow crab, and spot shrimp, 2015-2018

• Main Author: Alaska Department Of Fish And Game
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Axiom Data Science 2019
• Subjects: Bering Sea; Chionoecetes opilio; Paralithodes camtschaticus; Red king crab; Snow crab; Alaska
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.24431/rw1k335; https://search.dataone.org/#view/10.24431/rw1k335

These data are part of a crustacean age determination project. Specifically, these data describe thin section quality and band counts produced from gastric mill ossicles and eyestalks of red king crab, snow crab, and spot shrimp. The data set consists of three comma separated files exported from a Microsoft excel workbook. The data consists of 1. thin section quality/readability and structure measurements, 2. independent band count estimates from four different age readers (precision testing), and 3. final band count estimates for large and small animals of each species. New shell male red king crab (Paralithodes camtschaticus) were sampled during the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) crab and groundfish survey from Bristol Bay on June 9, 2015. New shell male snow crab (Chionoecetes opilio) were collected during the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) crab and groundfish survey from the eastern Bering Sea on June 24 and July 5, 2015. Spot shrimp (Pandalus platyceros) were collected during ADF&G pot surveys conducted in Southeast Alaska in Ernest Sound in September 2015. Carapace length/width, chela height, and sex were taken with calipers and recorded for each individual. Paired eyestalks (for crabs and shrimp) and stomachs containing the gastric mill (for crabs only, paired zygocardiac ossicles and the uromesocardiac ossicle) were dissected, cleaned, weighed and measured.