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Fishery and Sea ResourcesFigure 7: Average growth rate for 2005 trawls (•) (increment width data) and their confidencelimits; average column temperature in the trawls ().ries, during the first 50 days, showed significantlower levels compared to August(Figure 6). The overall average otolithmicro-increments width pattern showed afirst zone with an increasing width startingfrom 4 and reaching maximum of 14 micronsat 35 days, while after this age thewidth decreases slowly to reach 3 micronat 115 days. The average growth rate obtainedby the linear regression of lengthat age data (observed) was 0.35 mm·d −1(F 1,116 = 56.02; p < 0.001) (Figure 8),which compared with the higher growthrate (backcalculated) over the whole agerange, suggests that the estimated slope reflectsmore the first and last growth phasesbetween 30 and 40 days and above the 80thday onwards.4 Discussion and conclusionsScanning electron and optical microscopesbased studies highlighted how importantthe sectioning process is for agereadings and interpretation purposes [24,26].The differences in growth rates ob-2064