Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Sep 28;8(1):coaa089.
doi: 10.1093/conphys/coaa089. eCollection 2020.

Investigating impacts of and susceptibility to rail noise playback across freshwater fishes reveals counterintuitive response profiles

Ryan J Friebertshauser  1 , Daniel E Holt  2 , Carol E Johnston  1 , Matthew G Smith  3 , Mary T Mendonça  3
Affiliations

Investigating impacts of and susceptibility to rail noise playback across freshwater fishes reveals counterintuitive response profiles

Ryan J Friebertshauser et al. Conserv Physiol. .

Abstract

While the expansion of anthropogenic noise studies in aquatic habitats has produced conservation-based results for a range of taxa, relatively little attention has been paid to the potential impacts on stream fishes. Recent work has shown responses to road noise in single species of stream fish; however, assemblage-wide effects of anthropogenic noise pollution have not yet been investigated. By examining five metrics of disturbance across four ecologically and evolutionarily disparate species of stream fishes, a series of laboratory experiments aimed to describe the effects of and species susceptibility to anthropogenic noise playback. Each species studied represented a unique combination of hearing sensitivity and water column position. Physiological and behavioral metrics were compared across the presence and absence of rail-noise noise playback in four target species. Through repeated subsampling, the temporal dynamics of cortisol secretion in response to noise in two target species were additionally described. Rail-noise playback had no statistically significant effect on blood glucose or water-borne cortisol levels, with the exception of decreased cortisol in noise-exposed largescale stoneroller (Campostoma oligolepis). Time-course cortisol experiments revealed rapid secretion and showed minimal effects of noise at most observation points. The presence of noise produced significant changes in ventilation rate and swimming parameters in a portion of the four species observed representing the most conserved responses. Overall, effects of noise were observed in species contrary to what would be hypothesized based on theoretical hearing sensitivity and water column position demonstrating that predicting susceptibility to this type of stressor cannot be accomplished based off these course considerations alone. More importantly, we show that anthropogenic noise can disrupt a variety of behavioral and physiological processes in certain taxa and should be further investigated via measures of fitness in the wild.

Keywords: Anthropogenic noise; bioacoustics; conservation; rail noise; stress.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Waveform (top), spectrogram (middle) and power spectral density (bottom) visualization of the rail-noise playback used throughout this study.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Physiological metrics of disturbance across rail-noise and silence-exposed individuals from each species. Presented as mean ± SE. Asterisks indicate statistical significance.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Log10 water-borne cortisol concentrations collected at 5, 15 and 30 min from blacktail shiner and bluegill sunfish. Presented as mean ± SE. Asterisk denotes statistical significance.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Behavioral metrics of disturbance across rail-noise and silence-exposed individuals from each species. Presented as mean ± SE. Asterisks denote statistical significance.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Abboud JA, Coombs S (2000) Mechanosensory-based orientation to elevated prey by a benthic fish. Mar Freshw Behav Phy 33: 261–279.
    1. Akamatsu T, Okumura T, Novarini N, Yan HY (2002) Empirical refinements applicable to the recording of fish sounds in small tanks. J Acoust Soc Am 112: 3073–3082. - PubMed
    1. Algera DA, Brownscombe JW, Gilmour KM, Lawrence MJ, Zolderdo AJ, Cooke SJ (2017) Cortisol treatment affects locomotor activity and swimming behaviour of male smallmouth bass engaged in paternal care: a field study using acceleration biologgers. Physiol Behav 181: 59–68. - PubMed
    1. Amorim MCP, Hawkins AD (2000) Growling for food: acoustic emissions during competitive feeding of the streaked gurnard. J Fish Biol 57: 895–907.
    1. Barton BA, Iwama GK (1991) Physiological changes in fish from stress in aquaculture with emphasis on the response and effects of corticosteroids. Annu Rev Fish Dis 1: 3–26.