Daily settlement of the puerulus stage of the red rock lobster Jasus edwardsii at Castlepoint, New Zealand.

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Abstract
Daily settlement of the puerulus stage of the red rock lobster Jasus edwardsii at Castlepoint in the North Island of New Zealand was monitored on artificial collectors during January and Feb-ruary 1989. Considerable differences in the average daily settlement rates were found between groups of shore collectors, and with time. Settlement rates on all collectors increased near new moon in early February, these increased rates generally persisting until the experiment ended near full moon late in February. The highest settlement rate was 5 pueruli per collector per day. Overall means of daily settlement rates of pueruli were 0.75 and 0.50 per offshore and shore collector, respectively, while very small numbers of the newly moulted post-pueruli were captured. It was not possible to relate directly changes in rates of settlement with any of the environmental variables recorded. Unlike in many other palinurids, it appears that larval recruitment rates for J. edwardsii at Castlepoint can be estimated from collectors checked at any part of the lunar cycle. It is possible that some pueruli from nearby substrata migrate onto the shore collectors. Artificial collectors such as the ones used in this study are a potential means of collecting pueruli for ongrowing in aquaculture.

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