The goal of this study was to provide basic data necessary for managing fish in the Seomgang River by confirming diversity of fish species in the Seomgang River and determining the degree of change in fish species through a comparison with earlier related work. Growth rate, obesity level, and temporal and spatial reproductive capacities were analyzed to determine growth characteristics of dominant species. Fish fauna and structure of the fish community were surveyed at three different time points from October of 2020 to August of 2021 at eight sites. In addition, growth characteristics of Zacco platypus from June of 2021 to July of 2022 at four sites were determined. A total of 3,999 individuals, 43 species, and ten families of fish were identified. Among these species, 19 (44.19%) were Korean endemic species and four (9.30%) were endangered species. The dominant species was Z. platypus. Pungtungia herzi was identified as a subdominant species. An analysis of length-weight relationships and condition factor (k) of Z. platypus confirmed a good state of growth. As a result of a frequency analysis of the total length, the life cycle of the Z. platypus population living in the Seomgang River was found to be stable. According to gonadosomatic index (GSI) analysis, the spawning season of Z. platypus was estimated to occur after May, consistent with the literature.

This study investigated the effect of bactocease, as a natural preservative, on the microbial growth and quality of fried fish paste during storage. To select the optimal concentration of bactocease, the inhibition effect of its different treatment concentrations (0.2, 0.4, and 0.8%) on total aerobic bacteria in fish paste dough during 5 days of storage was examined. The sample treated with 0.4% bactocease showed a 1.21 log reduction in microorganisms compared with that of the control. This result was higher than that with 0.2% bactocease and potassium sorbate and similar to that with 0.8% bactocease. Consequently, 0.4% bactocease was chosen as the best concentration for preparing the fried fish paste. Microbial growth on fried samples treated with preservatives was more inhibited by adding preservatives regardless of their type than that of the control after 15 days of storage. In addition, there were no significant differences in the quality between the samples treated with 0.4% bactocease and 0.2% potassium sorbate, such as volatile basic nitrogen contents, TBARS values, pH, and acidity. Therefore, these results indicate that food preservatives should be added into fried fish paste for controlling microbial growth, and bactocease can have a high potential to replace potassium sorbate in processed marine foods, including fried fish paste.

This study aims to suggest the methodology to improve to estimate back-calculated fish growth parameters using weighted average. It is to contribute to correct errors in the calculation of back-calculated growth equation with unequal numbers of sample by age. If the numbers of sample were evenly collected by age, each back-calculated length at age was equal between arithmetic and weighted averages. However, most samples cannot be evenly collected by age in reality because of different catchability by fishing gear and limitation of environment condition. Therefore, the estimation of back-calculated length by weighted average method is essential to calculate growth parameters. There were some published growth equations from back-calculated length using a simple arithmetic average with different numbers of samples by age when searching for back-calculated growth equations from 91 relevant papers. In this study, the process of deriving growth equation was investigated and two different average calculations were applied to a fish growth equation, for example of Acheilognathus signifer. Growth parameters, such as L∞, k and t0, were estimated from two different back-calculated averages and the growth equations were compared with growth performance index. Based on the correction of back-calculated length using weighted average by age, the changes by female and male were -14.19% and -5.23% for L∞, and 59.28% and 18.91% for k, respectively. The corrected growth performance index by weighted average improved at 7.05% and 2.46% by female and male, respectively, compared to the arithmetic averages.

The age and growth of rabbit fish, Siganus fuscescens were investigated from samples monthly collected in the coast of Jeju island, Korea from February to December 2012. Ages were determined from annuli in otoliths, and annuli were formed in one or two months immediately after spawning once a year. Also, main spawning period was estimated between July and August, thus rings were considered as annual marks. The von Bertalanffy growth equations estimated from a non-linear regression method were Lt=37.24 (1－e－0.33(t + 1.24)) (R2=0.92) for female and Lt=31.44(1－e－0.45(t + 1.23)) (R2=0.90) for male, and the growth between female and male was different.