Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish
Abstract An increase in habitat complexity is thought to decrease visibility and the territory size of visually oriented animals. Hence, the addition of physical structure has been viewed as a useful restoration technique to increase the density of territorial species, particularly in stream fishes....
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crwiley:10.1111/eth.12456 2024-09-15T17:56:29+00:00 Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish Bilhete, Caroline Grant, James W.A. Ebensperger, L. Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada 2015 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/eth.12456 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Feth.12456 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/eth.12456 en eng Wiley http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor Ethology volume 122, issue 2, page 151-157 ISSN 0179-1613 1439-0310 journal-article 2015 crwiley https://doi.org/10.1111/eth.12456 2024-08-01T04:22:04Z Abstract An increase in habitat complexity is thought to decrease visibility and the territory size of visually oriented animals. Hence, the addition of physical structure has been viewed as a useful restoration technique to increase the density of territorial species, particularly in stream fishes. However, a decrease in territory size may have a negative effect on the fitness of individual organisms. We attempted to quantify some of the positive and negative effects of increasing habitat structure on the behaviour and growth rate of wild young‐of‐the‐year ( YOY ) Atlantic salmon. Fish were exposed to one of two habitat treatments in mesh enclosures in Catamaran Brook, New Brunswick: a gravel substrate (low complexity) or a gravel substrate with boulders added (high complexity). Wild‐caught individuals were tagged, weighed and measured before being stocked at densities of 1·m −2 for 7‐d trials. While fish from high‐complexity treatments benefited from lower rates of aggression, they also had lower foraging rates and smaller territories compared to those in low‐complexity treatments. Specific growth rate, however, did not differ significantly between treatments. While the addition of structure to a habitat may be beneficial at the population level in terms of an increase in population density, our results suggested that individual fish may pay some short‐term costs in these environments. Further research is needed to evaluate the longer term costs and benefits of adding structure to improve the habitat quality for stream salmonids. Article in Journal/Newspaper Atlantic salmon Wiley Online Library Ethology 122 2 151 157 |
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English |
description |
Abstract An increase in habitat complexity is thought to decrease visibility and the territory size of visually oriented animals. Hence, the addition of physical structure has been viewed as a useful restoration technique to increase the density of territorial species, particularly in stream fishes. However, a decrease in territory size may have a negative effect on the fitness of individual organisms. We attempted to quantify some of the positive and negative effects of increasing habitat structure on the behaviour and growth rate of wild young‐of‐the‐year ( YOY ) Atlantic salmon. Fish were exposed to one of two habitat treatments in mesh enclosures in Catamaran Brook, New Brunswick: a gravel substrate (low complexity) or a gravel substrate with boulders added (high complexity). Wild‐caught individuals were tagged, weighed and measured before being stocked at densities of 1·m −2 for 7‐d trials. While fish from high‐complexity treatments benefited from lower rates of aggression, they also had lower foraging rates and smaller territories compared to those in low‐complexity treatments. Specific growth rate, however, did not differ significantly between treatments. While the addition of structure to a habitat may be beneficial at the population level in terms of an increase in population density, our results suggested that individual fish may pay some short‐term costs in these environments. Further research is needed to evaluate the longer term costs and benefits of adding structure to improve the habitat quality for stream salmonids. |
author2 |
Ebensperger, L. Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Bilhete, Caroline Grant, James W.A. |
spellingShingle |
Bilhete, Caroline Grant, James W.A. Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
author_facet |
Bilhete, Caroline Grant, James W.A. |
author_sort |
Bilhete, Caroline |
title |
Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
title_short |
Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
title_full |
Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
title_fullStr |
Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
title_full_unstemmed |
Short‐term Costs and Benefits of Habitat Complexity for a Territorial Fish |
title_sort |
short‐term costs and benefits of habitat complexity for a territorial fish |
publisher |
Wiley |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/eth.12456 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Feth.12456 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/eth.12456 |
genre |
Atlantic salmon |
genre_facet |
Atlantic salmon |
op_source |
Ethology volume 122, issue 2, page 151-157 ISSN 0179-1613 1439-0310 |
op_rights |
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1111/eth.12456 |
container_title |
Ethology |
container_volume |
122 |
container_issue |
2 |
container_start_page |
151 |
op_container_end_page |
157 |
_version_ |
1810432690525044736 |