QUANTITATIVE-ANALYSIS OF PUBLISHED DATA ON THE GROWTH, METABOLISM, FOOD-CONSUMPTION, AND RELATED FEATURES OF THE RED-BELLIED PIRANHA, SERRASALMUS NATTERERI (CHARACIDAE)

A tentative set of growth parameters of the von Bertalanffy growth equ ation were estimated for the red-bellied piranha, Serrasalmus natterer i, a common characid of the Amazonas and adjacent floodplains, based o n length-frequency data collected by R.H. Lowe-McConnell in Guyana. Th ese parameters and related statistics are then used, along with publis hed data from metabolic, field and feeding experiment data to estimate the relative food consumption of a population of S. nattereri. This i s complemented with biological data assembled from the scattered liter ature on S. nattereri to provide a 'snapshot' of this species.