Laboratory captivity can affect scores of metabolic rates and activity in wild brown trout

Závorka, L. et al. (2019) Laboratory captivity can affect scores of metabolic rates and activity in wild brown trout. Journal of Zoology, 307(4), pp. 249-255. (doi: 10.1111/jzo.12642)

Abstract

Phenotypic scoring of wild animals under standardized laboratory conditions is important as it allows field ecologists and evolutionary biologists to understand the development and maintenance of interindividual differences in plastic traits (e.g. behaviour and physiology). However, captivity is associated with a shift from a natural familiar environment to an unfamiliar and artificial environment, which may affect estimates of plastic phenotypic traits. In this study, we tested how previous experience with laboratory environments and time spent in captivity affects behavioural (i.e. activity) and metabolic (i.e. standard and maximum metabolic rates) scoring of our model species, wild brown trout Salmo trutta. We found that individuals with previous experience of laboratory captivity (10.5 months earlier) showed higher activity in an open field test than individuals with no prior experience of laboratory captivity. Previous experience with captivity had no significant effect on metabolic rates. However, metabolic rates seemed to increase with increasing time spent in captivity prior to the collection of measurements. Although there are benefits of keeping wild animals in captivity prior to scoring, our results suggest that while allowing for sufficient acclimatization researchers should aim at minimizing time in captivity of wild animals to increase accuracy and ecological relevance of the scoring of plastic phenotypic traits.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: This work was supported by the BiodivERsA‐project SalmoInvade, which is funded by the Swedish Research Council Formas (Dnr: 226‐2013‐1875) and the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR‐EDIB‐0002).
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Koeck, Dr Barbara and Zavorka, Dr Libor
• Authors: Závorka, L., Brijs, J., Wengström, N., Wallerius, M.L., Näslund, J., Koeck, B., Aldvén, D., Lassus, R., Höjesjö, J., Johnsson, J.I., and Cucherousset, J.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Biodiversity, One Health & Veterinary Medicine
• Journal Name: Journal of Zoology
• Publisher: Wiley
• ISSN: 0952-8369
• ISSN (Online): 1469-7998
• Published Online: 10 December 2018
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2018 The Zoological Society of London
• First Published: First published in Journal of Zoology 307(4):249-255
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the publisher copyright policy