A Study on the Relationships between Some Morphological and Reproductive Traits of the Turkish Crayfish, Astacus leptodactylus Eschscholtz, 1823 (Crustacea: Decapoda)

Abstract

This study was carried out to investigate relationships between some morphological and reproductive traits of the Turkish crayfish, A. leptodactylus, collected from a controlled irrigation lake in the Yenice province (Çanakkale, Turkey), between July 2007 and June 2008. For this objective, two multivariate analysis techniques, namely canonical correlation analysis and multivariate multiple linear regression analysis, were used. The results of the canonical correlation analysis have shown that the morphological traits may be used to predict the changes in the reproductive traits. For instance, canonical correlation analysis results suggested that the egg weight and the number of eggs are related to the total length, carapace length, and carapace width. The results of multivariate multiple linear regression analysis, on the other hand, show a slightly different picture. Therefore, it is possible to conclude that both canonical correlation and multivariate regression results can be taken into consideration together when investigating the relations between two variable sets.