A comparison of von Bertalanffy and polynomial functions in modelling fish growth data

Abstract

Compared the von Bertalanffy growth function (VBGF) and five polynomial functions in modelling fish growth for 16 populations comprising six species of freshwater fishes. Ranked results of the variance explained by each growth function indicated that VBGF described growth data better than three- and four-parameter polynomial functions. Log-transforming length and age greatly improved the goodness-of-fit of the three-parameter polynomial function. Statistical comparison of growth between populations or sexes was done using a general linear model for polynomial functions. -from Authors