James T. Peterson Cecil A. Jennings Michael D. Homer Jr. 2015 <p><span>Back-calculation of length-at-age from otoliths and spines is a common technique employed in fisheries biology, but few studies have compared the precision of data collected with this method for catfish populations. We compared precision of back-calculated lengths-at-age for an introduced</span><i>Ictalurus furcatus</i><span> (Blue Catfish) population among 3 commonly used cross-sectioning techniques. We used gillnets to collect Blue Catfish (</span><i>n</i><span> = 153) from Lake Oconee, GA. We estimated ages from a basal recess, articulating process, and otolith cross-section from each fish. We employed the Frasier-Lee method to back-calculate length-at-age for each fish, and compared the precision of back-calculated lengths among techniques using hierarchical linear models. Precision in age assignments was highest for otoliths (83.5%) and lowest for basal recesses (71.4%). Back-calculated lengths were variable among fish ages 1–3 for the techniques compared; otoliths and basal recesses yielded variable lengths at age 8. We concluded that otoliths and articulating processes are adequate for age estimation of Blue Catfish.</span></p> application/pdf 10.1656/058.014.0417 en Eagle Hill Institute Evaluation of three aging techniques and back-calculated growth for introduced Blue Catfish from Lake Oconee, Georgia article