Lee F. G. Gutowsky

Fisheries and Oceans Canada | DFO · Arctic and Aquatic Research

Urban streams are impacted by multiple anthropogenic environmental stressors that exert considerable pressure on resident fish populations. Species such as brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) are particularly vulnerable because urban environments typically limit the cold oxygenated water required by all life stages. To understand factors associated...

Movement of fishes in the aquatic realm is fundamental to their ecology and survival. Movement can be driven by a variety of biological, physiological, and environmental factors occurring across all spatial and temporal scales. The intrinsic capacity of movement to impact fish individually (e.g., foraging) with potential knock‐on effects throughout...

Understanding and ultimately predicting how marine organisms will respond to urbanization is central for effective wildlife conservation and management in the Anthropocene. Sharks are upper trophic level predators in virtually all marine environments, but if and how their behaviors are influenced by coastal urbanization remains understudied. Here,...

Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) are an iconic freshwater salmonid native to northeastern North America. They prefer cold, clean rivers and lakes, and have been culturally, socially and economically valued for decades. Overharvest and deforestation associated with European settlement in southern Ontario, Canada led to notable declines in brook t...

Identifying optimal habitat and predicting species distributions are essential components in developing management priorities for species of concern. In Nova Scotia, Canada, the breeding population of American woodcock (Scolopax minor) has been in decline over the past 50 years, likely in part because of reduced availability of habitat. We aimed to...

Fisheries monitoring can be improved by studying the influence of gear selectivity, sampling design and habitat conditions. We used boat-electrofishing data to investigate how sample unit placement (shoreline and channel transects), and sampling conditions (low and high flow years) affects detection of fishes in a highly regulated Ontario (Canada)...

Under global climate change, storm events are predicted to increase in strength and frequency. Although aquatic animals can be affected by acute natural disturbances, information on the immediate consequences of these weather systems on the behavioral ecology of highly mobile aquatic predators remains limited. Here we examine the spatial distributi...

To better understand the ecology of coldwater fishes in urban‐dominated landscapes, factors influencing seasonal brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) habitat use were assessed using backpack electrofishing surveys in three urban groundwater‐fed streams in central Ontario. Generalised additive models revealed that yearling brook trout (<100 mm TL) we...

1. Habitat loss and degradation are contributing to severe declines in many North American bird species. For American woodcock Scolopax minor ('woodcock'), loss of preferred young forest habitat matrices are generally attributed as the primary drivers of range-wide population declines in eastern North America, but regional patterns in abundance or...

The effects of anthropogenic noise have garnered significant attention in marine ecosystems, but comparatively less is known about its impacts on freshwater ecosystems. For fish that provide parental care, the effects of acoustic disturbance could have fitness-level consequences if nest tending behavior is altered. This study explored the effects o...

Endemic species face a variety of threats including predation from non‐native invaders. In some cases, however, invasive species can be managed by directly suppressing populations, and tracking technologies that allow researchers to identify movement patterns and aggregations representative of the population can facilitate suppression activities. I...

Telemetry is an increasingly common tool for studying the ecology of wild fish, with great potential to provide valuable information for management and conservation. For researchers to conduct a robust telemetry study, many essential considerations exist related to selecting the appropriate tag type, fish capture and tagging methods, tracking proto...

Telemetry, or the remote monitoring of animals with electronic transmitters and receivers, has vastly enhanced our ability to study aquatic animals. Radio telemetry, acoustic telemetry and passive integrated transponders are three common technologies that generate detection data — time‐stamped, tag‐specific records that are logged by receivers. We...

Canada's coasts provide vital habitat for congregations of birds throughout the year, including during the nonbreeding period. On the Atlantic coast, the Purple Sandpiper (Calidris maritima) and Harlequin Duck (Histrionicus histrionicus) are both known for their hardiness through the winter, electing to rest and forage along some of the most turbul...

Stock assessments of Walleye Sander vitreus in Lake Erie rely on a combination of suspended and bottom overnight gill‐net surveys to provide population and demographic information. An assumption that Walleye undertake diel vertical migrations and become available to the suspended gill nets at night has never been validated. To understand how vertic...

Incidental capture of protected fishes usually calls for immediate release, however, post-release survival has not been investigated for many protected species. The American eel Anguilla rostrata is an example of an imperiled species that is incidentally captured by recreational anglers, but for which the impacts of catch and release are unknown. I...

The expanding human global footprint and growing demand for fresh water have placed tremendous stress on inland aquatic ecosystems. Aichi Target 10 of the Convention on Biological Diversity aims to minimize anthropogenic pressures affecting vulnerable ecosystems, and pressure interactions are increasingly being incorporated into environmental manag...

Many coastal embayments in the Laurentian Great Lakes have been subjected to extensive human physical modification and pollution that has led to the loss of freshwater biodiversity. For example, Hamilton Harbour is a large coastal embayment situated at the western end of Lake Ontario, with a long history of industrial and urban development that has...

Freshwater ecosystems are among the most threatened on Earth. The 5 key human-caused pressures are water extraction, habitat degradation (e.g., fragmentation or chemical pollution), overexploitation of fisheries resources, aquatic invasive species, and climate change. Understanding how multiple stressors associated with these pressures interact to...

Aim Many invasive populations exhibit dynamic life history shifts along their invasion route. We investigated whether these shifts represent consistent biological responses of a given species to range expansion, even in systems located in different geographic regions. Location North‐eastern France, Central Ontario (Canada). Method We investigated...

Recreational fishing is a popular activity in aquatic ecosystems around the globe using a variety of gears including rod and line and to a lesser extent handlines, spears, bow and arrow, traps and nets. Similar to the propensity to engage in voluntary catch-and-release, the propensity to harvest fishes strongly varies among cultures, locations, spe...

The stress axis in teleost fish attempts to maintain internal homeostasis in the face of allostatic loading. However, stress axis induction has been associated with a higher predation rate in fish. To date, the physiological and behavioural factors associated with this outcome are poorly understood. The purpose of the present study was to investiga...

Knowledge of the diel spatial ecology of wild animals is of great interest to ecologists and relevant to resource management and conservation. Sharks are generally considered to be more active during nocturnal periods than during the day; however, few studies have empirically evaluated diel variation in shark habitat use and how anthropogenic distu...

Bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) are a thermally sensitive cold-water species with a threatened conservation status across much of North America. To improve our understanding of bull trout thermal ecology, we tagged more than 150 adults with temperature sensing acoustic biotelemetry transmitters and monitored the animals in a British Columbia re...

1.The variation in migration that comprise partial diel migrations, putatively occur entirely as a consequence of behavioural flexibility. However, seasonal partial migrations are increasingly recognised to be mediated by a combination of reversible plasticity in response to environmental variation and individual variation due to genetic and enviro...

Electric fish handling gloves (FHGs) have been developed to immobilize fish during handling, with the potential benefit of reducing the time needed for sedation and recovery of fish relative to chemical anaesthetics. We examined the secondary stress responses (i.e., hematocrit, blood glucose, lactate, and pH) and reflex responses of Largemouth Bass...

Hydrokinetic turbines (HTs) are being proposed for placement in riverine landscapes around the globe. Here, we implanted 40 adult lake sturgeon and 40 adult walleye with acoustic telemetry transmitters to monitor their lateral and vertical space use at the Canadian Hydrokinetic Turbine Testing Centre (CHTTC) located in the Seven Sisters Generating...

Little is known about the spatial ecology and behaviour of bowfin (Amia calva), despite the fact that it is an important freshwater carnivore, the last living member of the Amiiformes and effectively a living fossil. In the summer of 2013, acoustic telemetry transmitters were surgically implanted in ten bowfin captured in Toronto Harbour on Lake On...

Widespread human development has led to impairment of freshwater coastal wetlands and embayments, which provide critical and unique habitat for many freshwater fish species. This is particularly evident in the Laurentian Great Lakes, where such habitats have been severely altered over the last century as a result of industrial activities, urbanizat...

Despite many similarities and intuitive links between individual dietary specialisation and behavioural inter-individual variation, these phenomena have been studied in isolation, and empirical data confirming relationships between these intraspecific variance sources are lacking. Here we use stable isotope analysis and acoustic telemetry to test t...

There is growing interest in educating anglers on catch-and-release (C&R) best practices, yet there is little information on whether angler education programs yield measurable improvements in fish condition and survival. As such, we conducted a study focused on mixed-gender youth groups (aged 8–10) and contrasted three levels of training interventi...

Parental care is an advantageous reproductive behavior, as the fitness of the caregiver is increased through improving the chances of its offspring’s survival. Parental care occurs in a variety of teleost fishes. The body size of parental fish and the size of their brood can affect nest abandonment decisions, where compared with smaller fish with s...

Bycatch, the incidental capture of non-target organisms, occurs in most commercial fisheries. Although immediate bycatch mortality is frequently documented in fisheries, detrimental sub-lethal effects and potential post-release mortality remain largely unknown despite the potential population-level consequences. Turtles are captured as bycatch and...

The objective of catch-and-release angling is for the fish to survive with minimal fitness consequences. However, fish survival can be compromised by a number of factors, especially anatomical hooking location. To evaluate whether hook type or bait influence hooking outcomes, we tested different combinations of hook (treble or single siwash hooks)...

Understandinghowindividuals are distributed in space and time, as well ashowthey interact with dynamic environmental conditions, represent fundamental knowledge gaps for many fish species. Using acoustic telemetry tags, we monitored the temperatures and depths used by northern pike (Esox lucius L., 1758) and largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides (...

Freshwater ecosystems are threatened by a wide range of anthropogenic infrastructure related to hydropower, irrigation, municipal withdrawals, and industrial cooling. Technology can be used to mitigate the loss of fish associated with such infrastructure by exploiting the sensory physiology of a species through stimuli designed to manipulate their...

Individuals cope differently to challenging and stressful situations. Being inverted is challenging and stressful for animals, as the position leaves them vulnerable to predators and desiccation. Although sea star self-righting was first studied in the 19th century, efforts to quantify patterns of within-individual consistency and among-individual...

Sharks are important apex predators in marine systems but many populations have experienced large declines, which has resulted in adverse effects on marine food webs. Sharks are also economically important , as their fins are valued in Asian markets. In response to concerns about declining shark populations, a number of nations, including Australia...

Freshwater fish move vertically and horizontally through the aquatic landscape for a variety of reasons, such as to find and exploit patchy resources or to locate essential habitats (e.g., for spawning). Inherent challenges exist with the assessment of fish populations because they are moving targets. We submit that quantifying and describing the s...

In this study, animal-borne telemetry with temperature sensors was coupled with extensive habitat temperature monitoring in a dimictic reservoir, to test the following hypotheses: behavioural thermoregulation occurs throughout the year and temperature selection varies on a diel and seasonal basis, in a winter-specialist diel-migrating fish. Burbot...

In North America, burbot Lota lota (L.), interactions with hydropower are common, southern burbot populations are endangered and hydropower has been implicated in the decline. Thus, the objectives of this review were to identify threats and benefits of hydropower to riverine and reservoir dwelling burbot, assess overall impacts and identify key res...

Delays in peer reviewed publication may have consequences for both assessment of scientific prowess in academics as well as communication of important information to the knowledge receptor community. We present an analysis on the perspectives of authors publishing in conservation biology journals regarding their opinions on the importance of speed...

Animal movement occurs as a function of many factors including changing environmental conditions (e.g., seasonality) and the internal state (e.g., phenotypic traits) of the focal organism. Identifying how these factors interact can reveal behavioral patterns that would otherwise go undiscovered. Given a large sample size of individuals (n = 187), w...

Group living in animals is a well-studied phenomenon, having been documented extensively in a wide range of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine species. Although social dynamics are complex across space and time, recent technological and analytical advances enable deeper understanding of their nature and ecological implications. While for some taxa...

Group living in animals is a well-studied phenomenon, having been documented extensively in a wide range of terrestrial, freshwater and marine species. While social dynamics are complex across space and time, recent technological and analytical advances enable deeper understanding of their nature and ecological implications. While for some taxa a g...

The trade-off between remaining stationary and being active has consequences for the survival and growth of fishes. Recent advancements in telemetry tools have enabled researchers to assess activity patterns of free-swimming fishes using tri-axial acceleration-sensing acoustic transmitters. This study describes the summer activity patterns of muske...

Knowledge of the swimming energetics and thermal ecology of sub-tropical and tropical coastal species is extremely limited, yet this information is critical for understanding animal–environment relationships in the face of climate change. Using the ecologically and economically important sportfish, bonefish (Albula vulpes), we determined the critic...

Fishways have been developed to restore longitudinal connectivity in rivers. Despite their potential for aiding fish passage, fishways may represent a source of significant energetic expenditure for fish as they are highly turbulent environments. Nonetheless, our understanding of the physiological mechanisms underpinning fishway passage of fish is...

Fishways have been developed to restore longitudinal connectivity in rivers. Despite their potential for aiding fish passage, fishways may represent a source of significant energetic expenditure for fish as they are highly turbulent environments. Nonetheless, our understanding of the physiological mechanisms underpinning fishway passage of fish is...

Sharks are important apex predators in marine systems but many populations have experienced large declines, which has resulted in adverse effects on marine food webs. Sharks are also economically important, as their fins are valued in Asian markets. In response to concerns about declining shark populations, a number of nations, including Australia,...

Delays in peer reviewed publication may have consequences for both assessment of scientific prowess in academics as well as communication of important information to the knowledge receptor community. We present an analysis on the perspectives of authors publishing in conservation biology journals regarding their opinions on the importance of speed...

As catch-and-release angling continues to grow as a management and conservation strategy, understanding the mechanisms contributing to potential negative consequences for released fish is essential for developing sustainable recreational fisheries. Longer angling times generally contribute to increased stress and mortality in fish such that reducin...

Although personality has been documented in numerous animals and characters, research into personality-dependent spatial ecology has focused on dispersal. Indeed, few authors have investigated the role of other important spatial traits such as home range, movement distance, vertical activity, and site fidelity, and it is not clear whether these beh...

Background Animals adjust activity budgets as competing demands for limited time and energy shift across life history phases. For far-ranging migrants and especially pelagic seabirds, activity during breeding and migration are generally well studied but the prolonged “overwinter” phase has received less attention. Yet this is a critical time for re...

Fish entrainment through turbine intakes is one of the major issues for operators of hydropower facilities because it causes injury and/or mortality and adversely affects population abundance. Here we used fine-scale acoustic biotelemetry and state-space modeling to investigate behavioural attributes associated with entrainment risk for adult bull...

Heterogeneity in spatial ecology is often observed within fish populations, although few researchers have investigated whether these between-individual differences are temporally consistent and thus represent personality-dependent behaviour. Furthermore, between-individual differences in dispersal and the relationships between dispersal and site fi...

Background: Fish entrainment through turbine intakes is one of the major issues for operators of hydropower facilities because it causes injury and/or mortality and adversely affects population abundance. Entrainment reduction strategies have been developed based on the behavior of downstream migrating fishes, particularly diadromous species. Howev...

Fine-scale behaviour such as foraging is difficult to quantify in free-swimming wild fish yet has important basic and applied implications. Here, we used tri-axial accelerometer biologgers to determine accelerometric predictors of bonefish Albula vulpes behaviours (resting, swimming, bursting, coasting, and foraging) in a wetland mesocosm in Eleuth...

Fine -scale behaviour such as foraging is difficult to measure remotely, yet has important basic and applied applications. Here, we used tri-axial accelerometry to determine accelerometric predictors of bonefish (Albula vulpes) behaviours (resting, swimming, bursting, drifting, and foraging) in an enclosed wetland in Eleuthera, The Bahamas. We also...

Fish entrainment occurs when individuals are displaced from reservoirs to downstream waters by way of water diversion through turbines or other water release structures. While much effort has been put into quantifying and reducing entrainment of downstream migrating salmonids, considerably less research has focused on fish that are residents in res...