Mitigation of acidified salmon rivers - effects of liming on young brown trout Salmo trutta.

In southern Norway, 22 acidified rivers supporting anadromous salmonids were mitigated with lime to improve water quality and restore fish populations. In 13 of these rivers, effects on Salmo trutta and Salmo salar densities were monitored over 10-12 years, grouped into age 0 and age ≥ 1 year fish. These rivers had a mean annual discharge of between 4·9 and 85·5 m3 s-1 , and six of them were regulated for hydro-power production. Salmo salar were lost in six of these rivers prior to liming, and highly reduced in the remaining seven rivers. Post-liming, S. salar became re-established in all six rivers with lost populations, and recovered in the seven other rivers. Salmo trutta occurred in all 13 study rivers prior to liming. Despite the improved water quality, both age 0 and age ≥ 1 year S. trutta densities decreased as S. salar density increased, with an average reduction of >50% after 10 years of liming. For age 0 year S. trutta this effect was less strong in rivers where S. salar were present prior to liming. In contrast, densities of S. trutta increased in unlimed streams above the anadromous stretches in two of the rivers following improved water quality due to natural recovery. Density increases of both age 0 and age ≥ 1 year S. salar showed a positive effect of river discharge. The results suggest that the decline in S. trutta density after liming is related to interspecific resource competition due to the recovery of S. salar. Thus, improved water quality through liming may not only sustain susceptible species, but can have a negative effect on species that are more tolerant prior to the treatment, such as S. trutta.

Ice-dependent winter survival of juvenile Atlantic salmon.

Changes in snow and ice conditions are some of the most distinctive impacts of global warming in cold temperate and Arctic regions, altering the environment during a critical period for survival for most animals. Laboratories studies have suggested that reduced ice cover may reduce the survival of stream dwelling fishes in Northern environments. This, however, has not been empirically investigated in natural populations in large rivers. Here, we examine how the winter survival of juvenile Atlantic salmon in a large natural river, the River Alta (Norway, 70°N), is affected by the presence or absence of surface ice. Apparent survival rates for size classes corresponding to parr and presmolts were estimated using capture-mark-recapture and Cormack-Jolly-Seber models for an ice-covered and an ice-free site. Apparent survival (Φ) in the ice-covered site was greater than in the ice-free site, but did not depend on size class (0.64 for both parr and presmolt). In contrast, apparent survival in the ice-free site was lower for larger individuals (0.33) than smaller individuals (0.45). The over-winter decline in storage energy was greater for the ice-free site than the ice-covered site, suggesting that environmental conditions in the ice-free site caused a strong depletion in energy reserves likely affecting survival. Our findings highlight the importance of surface ice for the winter survival of juvenile fish, thus, underpinning that climate change, by reducing ice cover, may have a negative effect on the survival of fish adapted to ice-covered habitats during winter.

A concept for improving Atlantic salmon Salmo salar smolt migration past hydro power intakes.

In this study, cost effective (in terms of reducing loss of power production) measures for increasing bypass migration of Atlantic salmon Salmo salar were developed and tested by establishing statistical models for timing of smolt migration and favourable diversion of water to the bypass. Initial tracking of radio-tagged smolts showed very low bypass migration under normal hydropower operations. Bypass migration increased when bypass discharge was experimentally increased and a model was developed that described relationships between total river discharge, bypass diversion and smolt migration route. Further improvements were obtained by installing two strobe lights at the power-production tunnel entrance that increased bypass migration during the night, but not during daytime. According to the behaviour of radio-tagged fish, the implemented measures contributed to increasing the annual percentage of bypass migration from 11 to 64%, and according to model predictions to 60-74% when the hydropower facilities were operated according to the developed models. To ensure correct timing of discharge diversion a smolt migration model was developed based on environmental variables that could successfully predict the general pattern of migration timing. The concept presented for improving smolt migration past hydropower intakes should be applicable in many systems where migration past hydropower installations cannot easily be solved by screening systems.

Influence of sea temperature and initial marine feeding on survival of Atlantic salmon Salmo salar post-smolts from the Rivers Orkla and Hals, Norway.

The abundance of returning adult Atlantic salmon Salmo salar, in the River Orkla in mid-norway (1 sea-winter, SW, fish) and River Hals in north Norway (1-3 SW fish), was tested against the early marine feeding and the seawater temperature experienced by their corresponding year classes of post-smolts immediately after entry into the Trondheimsfjord (Orkla smolts, 22 years of data) and Altafjord (Hals smolts, 17 years of data). In both river-fjord systems, there was a significant positive correlation between the abundance of returning S. salar and the mean seawater temperature at the time of smolts descending to the sea. The number of 1SW fish reported caught in River Orkla was positively correlated to the proportion of fish larvae in the post-smolt stomachs in Trondheimsfjord. The abundance of returning S.salar was, however, neither correlated to forage ratio (R(F)) nor other prey groups in post-smolt stomachs in the two fjord systems. In the Altafjord, the post-smolts fed mainly on pelagic fish larva (70-98%) and had a stable R(F) (0.009-0.023) over the 6 years analysed. In the Trondheimsfjord, however, there was a higher variation in R(F) (0.003-0.036), and pelagic fish larvae were dominant prey in only two (50 and 91%) of the 8 years analysed. These 2 years also showed the highest return rates of S. salar in River Orkla. These results demonstrate that the thermal conditions experienced by post-smolts during their early sea migration may be crucial for the subsequent return rate of adults after 1-3 years at sea. Pelagic marine fish larvae seem to be the preferred initial prey for S. salar post-smolts. As the annual variation in abundance of fish larvae is related to seawater temperature, it is proposed that seawater temperature at sea entry and the subsequent abundance of returning adult S. salar may be indirectly linked through variation in annual availability of pelagic fish larvae or other suitable food items in the early post-smolt phase.

Inferring local adaptation from QST-FST comparisons: neutral genetic and quantitative trait variation in European populations of great snipe.

We applied a phenotypic QST (PST) vs. FST approach to study spatial variation in selection among great snipe (Gallinago media) populations in two regions of northern Europe. Morphological divergence between regions was high despite low differentiation in selectively neutral genetic markers, whereas populations within regions showed very little neutral divergence and trait differentiation. QST > FST was robust against altering assumptions about the additive genetic proportions of variance components. The homogenizing effect of gene flow (or a short time available for neutral divergence) has apparently been effectively counterbalanced by differential natural selection, although one trait showed some evidence of being under uniform stabilizing selection. Neutral markers can hence be misleading for identifying evolutionary significant units, and adopting the PST-FST approach might therefore be valuable when common garden experiments is not an option. We discuss the statistical difficulties of documenting uniform selection as opposed to divergent selection, and the need for estimating measurement error. Instead of only comparing overall QST and FST values, we advocate the use of partial matrix permutation tests to analyse pairwise QST differences among populations, while statistically controlling for neutral differentiation.

Major histocompatibility complex variation and mate choice in a lekking bird, the great snipe (Gallinago media).

Genes of the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) play a major part in the activation of the vertebrate immune system. In addition, they also appear to function as cues for mate choice. In mammals especially, several kinds of MHC-dependent mate choice have been hypothesized and observed. These include choice of mates that share no or few alleles with the choosing individual, choice of mates with alleles that differ as much as possible from the choosing individual, choice of heterozygous mates, choice of certain genotypes and choice of rare alleles. We investigated these different aspects of mate choice in relation to MHC in a lekking bird species, the great snipe (Gallinago media). We found no evidence for MHC disassortative mating, no preference for males with many MHC alleles and no preference for rare alleles. However, we did find that some allelic lineages were more often found in males with mating success than in males without mating success. Females do not seem to use themselves as references for the MHC-dependent mate choice, rather they seem to prefer males with certain allele types. We speculate that these alleles may be linked to resistance to common parasites.

Male mate choice, sexual conflict and strategic allocation of copulations in a lekking bird.

The males of lekking species are not expected to be choosy about mating because a reduced reproductive rate due to lost mating opportunities should outweigh any benefits of male choice. Females have traditionally not been expected to be competitive in this system since their reproduction has usually been assumed to be unconstrained by male availability. Here we show that, in contrast to these predictions, males are choosy and females may be competitive in the lekking great snipe Gallinago media. Males preferred by many females often refused to copulate with and even chased away females that the male had already copulated with, whereas females seemed to compete for repeated copulations. We conclude that choosiness may sometimes pay for popular males in those lekking species where females copulate repeatedly. Apparently, evolutionary conflicts of interest between individuals may cause a richer repertoire of behavioural adaptations than, to our knowledge, hitherto realized.

Females of the lekking great snipe do not prefer males with whiter tails.

A previous experimental study of great snipe, Gallinago media, has reported an effect on male mating success of the amount of white in their tails. That result is one of a very limited set of existing experimental results supporting a female mate preference for a morphological trait in animals. However, a later observational study did not find any correlation between amount of white and male mating success. If females sample a limited number of males, their preferences need not result in strong relationships between mating success and trait values in males, possibly explaining the failure to find the predicted correlation. Yet, females of lekking species are thought to have ample opportunities for mate sampling. To resolve these contrasting results, we present in this paper (1) a larger correlational study (several leks during 10 years) showing no relationship between male mating success and whiteness of tails (measured in several ways), and most importantly (2) evidence that individual females do not mate predominantly with males with very white tails among those males that each female samples. These results show that females do not prefer males with whiter tails as mates, within the contemporary natural variation in the trait. They also show that there is no sexual selection of the trait at present. This does not necessarily imply that white tails are not a sexually selected adaptation in males, but the mechanisms are likely to have been different from direct mate choice of whiter tails per se. Copyright 2000 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.

Colour bands, mate choice and paternity in the bluethroat.

Studies of several bird species have shown that coloured leg bands may affect a male's success in mate attraction and/or mating competition. From a colour band experiment in the field, we have previously reported that male bluethroats, Luscinia s. svecica, with blue and orange bands (BO males) guarded their mates less intensely at the peak of female fertility, and spent more time advertising for additional mates, than males banded with non-BO colours. These responses indicated that BO males experienced less threat to their paternity than did non-BO males, possibly mediated through an increased attractiveness. Here we present paternity analyses of the broods from the field study and test whether there were differences between the two male groups in within-pair or extrapair paternity. There were no significant differences between the two groups of males in paternity, suggesting effective male protection of paternity. However, extrapair paternity was infrequent in the 2 years of the field experiment; hence, the power in detecting effects on paternity does not allow a definitive conclusion on this issue. We also conducted an aviary experiment in which females were given the choice between a BO male and a non-BO male, to test whether females had preferences for particular colour bands. Females did not associate more with BO males, as would have been expected if these males were more attractive in social mate choice. Our results suggest that the effects of colour bands on social mate choice and paternity are, at best, weak. Copyright 2000 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.

Fluctuating asymmetry, mate choice and experimental designs

No Abstract Copyright 1997 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour1997The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour

Female bluethroats prefer males with symmetric colour bands

Fluctuating asymmetry in male ornaments may be related to male quality and therefore may be used by females as a guide in mate choice. Experiments on different species have shown female preferences for symmetry, but few previous studies have addressed preferences for symmetry in coloration. Using the bluethroat, Luscinia s. svecicaa passerine with a conspicuous blue and chestnut throat patch, as a model species, we devised an experiment in which the females could choose between males with either symmetric or asymmetric coloured leg bands. The females associated more with symmetric than asymmetric males, indicating a preference for symmetry.