Age reading analysis showed that the lifespan of sardine in the northern Aegean Sea may reach five years.
Mean monthly marginal increment analysis confirmed the formation of a single growth mark per year.
The majority of fish successfully aged (about 7% of scales were inconclusive and discarded) were aged one (males: 29.0%, females: 23.0%), two (males: 40.0%, females: 34.0%) and three (males: 21.0%, females: 26.0%) years old.
The mean length at age was higher for males in ages one and two and for females in ages three to five (Table 1).
The growth parameters (± SE) were estimated