Temperature-dependent stage durations of Irish sea Nephrops larvae

The relationships between temperature and stage duration of the three zoea stages of Irish Sea Nephrops norvegicus were investigated by culturing indi vidual larvae at five different temperatures. The relationships are require d for estimating daily larval production from survey data on abundance. The survival of cultured larvae was relatively high. Estimates of the temperat ure-stage duration relationships from data of individual larvae were differ ent from a previous Irish Sea study. However, using the average duration at each temperature gave relationships that were not significantly different from previous studies in the Irish Sea and Clyde. No larvae were successful ly reared to stage IV (post-zoea) at lower temperatures, so it was impossib le to assess the relationship between stage III larval duration and tempera ture.