The tilefish, Lopholatihis villarii Ribeiro, 1915 is a commercially-important demersal fish, in the Southeast Brazil, inhabiting calcareous and rocky substrates of the outer shelf and upper continental slope. This study was based on readings of the scale's age rings of 153 especimens, caught from March, 1995 to March, 1996. Scales were found to grow on an isometric proportion with fish length, and age rings are formed betvveen the third and fourth trimesters (winter and spring). The age groups of sampled fish varied from II to X years, and the growth equation in total length (cm) is Lt = I 13.4 [1-e -0.144 (t+ 1.4)] w ith the correspondem one in weight (kg): W, = 22.5[1-e -0.144 (1 + 14)]3 184 obtained from the weight/length regression equation: ln W = -11.95 + 3.184 In L. The tilefish has a low growth coefficient (K = 0.144), typical of camivorous specics of the fourth trophic levei, and it may reach, theoretically, 41 years of age.
Lopholaülus villarii; age and growth; Brazilian ichthyofauna