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Role of water flow regime in the swimming behaviour and escape performance of a schooling fish

Role of water flow regime in the swimming behaviour and escape performance of a schooling fish
Role of water flow regime in the swimming behaviour and escape performance of a schooling fish
Animals are exposed to variable and rapidly changing environmental flow conditions, such as wind in terrestrial habitats and currents in aquatic systems. For fishes, previous work suggests that individuals exhibit flow-induced changes in aerobic swimming performance. Yet, no one has examined whether similar plasticity is found in fast-start escape responses, which are modulated by anaerobic swimming performance, sensory stimuli and neural control. In this study, we used fish from wild schools of the tropical damselfish Chromis viridis from shallow reefs surrounding Lizard Island in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia. The flow regime at each site was measured to ascertain differences in mean water flow speed and its temporal variability. Swimming and escape behaviour in fish schools were video-recorded in a laminar-flow swim tunnel. Though each school's swimming behaviour (i.e. alignment and cohesion) was not associated with local flow conditions, traits linked with fast-start performance (particularly turning rate and the distance travelled with the response) were significantly greater in individuals from high-flow habitats. This stronger performance may occur due to a number of mechanisms, such as an in situ training effect or greater selection pressure for faster performance phenotypes in areas with high flow speed.
This article has an associated First Person interview with the first author of the paper.
Nadler, Lauren E.
1d1f8e6a-e951-41f5-888c-cfcb4b4b19dc
Killen, Shaun S.
1264c6da-6ec7-4d54-8ceb-2d462626743c
Domenici, Paolo
1a8cf671-af80-46f3-a2e3-4fa963a9f297
McCormick, Mark I.
18c6b112-782f-443c-b4f5-fda311b3d344
Nadler, Lauren E.
1d1f8e6a-e951-41f5-888c-cfcb4b4b19dc
Killen, Shaun S.
1264c6da-6ec7-4d54-8ceb-2d462626743c
Domenici, Paolo
1a8cf671-af80-46f3-a2e3-4fa963a9f297
McCormick, Mark I.
18c6b112-782f-443c-b4f5-fda311b3d344

Nadler, Lauren E., Killen, Shaun S., Domenici, Paolo and McCormick, Mark I. (2018) Role of water flow regime in the swimming behaviour and escape performance of a schooling fish. Biology Open, 7, [bio031997]. (doi:10.1242/bio.031997).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Animals are exposed to variable and rapidly changing environmental flow conditions, such as wind in terrestrial habitats and currents in aquatic systems. For fishes, previous work suggests that individuals exhibit flow-induced changes in aerobic swimming performance. Yet, no one has examined whether similar plasticity is found in fast-start escape responses, which are modulated by anaerobic swimming performance, sensory stimuli and neural control. In this study, we used fish from wild schools of the tropical damselfish Chromis viridis from shallow reefs surrounding Lizard Island in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia. The flow regime at each site was measured to ascertain differences in mean water flow speed and its temporal variability. Swimming and escape behaviour in fish schools were video-recorded in a laminar-flow swim tunnel. Though each school's swimming behaviour (i.e. alignment and cohesion) was not associated with local flow conditions, traits linked with fast-start performance (particularly turning rate and the distance travelled with the response) were significantly greater in individuals from high-flow habitats. This stronger performance may occur due to a number of mechanisms, such as an in situ training effect or greater selection pressure for faster performance phenotypes in areas with high flow speed.
This article has an associated First Person interview with the first author of the paper.

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More information

Accepted/In Press date: 3 September 2018
Published date: 19 October 2018

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 472543
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/472543
PURE UUID: 53f65c6d-c034-46df-af3e-9cd6636b8319
ORCID for Lauren E. Nadler: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-8225-8344

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Date deposited: 07 Dec 2022 18:06
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 04:16

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Contributors

Author: Lauren E. Nadler ORCID iD
Author: Shaun S. Killen
Author: Paolo Domenici
Author: Mark I. McCormick

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