Rodney A. Rountree

The Fish Listener

Passive acoustics is a rapidly emerging field of marine biology that until recently has received little attention from fisheries scientists and managers. In its simplest form, it is the act of listening to the sounds made by fishes and using that information as an aid in locating fish so that their habitat requirements and behaviors can be studied....

We sought to describe sounds of some of the common fishes suspected of producing unidentified air movement sounds in soundscape surveys of freshwater habitats in the New England region of North America. Soniferous behavior of target fishes was monitored in real time in the field in both natural and semi-natural environments by coupling Passive Acou...

The ecological importance of the freshwater soundscape is just beginning to be recognized by society. Scientists are beginning to apply Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) methods that are well established in marine systems to freshwater systems to map spatial and temporal patterns of behaviors associated with fish sounds as well as noise impacts on...

The soundscape composition of temperate freshwater habitats is poorly understood. Our goal was to document the occurrence of biological and anthropogenic sounds in freshwater habitats over a large (46,000 km²) area along the geographic corridors of five major river systems in North America (Connecticut, Kennebec, Merrimack, Presumpscot, and Saco)....

Four operational factors, together with high development cost, currently limit the use of ocean observatories in ecological and fisheries applications: 1) limited spatial coverage, 2) limited integration of multiple types of technologies, 3) limitations in the experimental design for in situ studies, and 4) potential unpredicted bias in monitoring...

Despite the importance of acoustic signaling in fishes, the prevalence of the behavioral contexts associated with their active (i.e., intentional) sound production remains unclear. A systematized review was conducted to explore documented acoustic behaviors in marine, subtropical fishes and potential influences affecting their relative pervasivenes...

This is an outline of ideas I've developed over the last few decades on the relationship between buoyancy control, sound production, and air breathing in fishes and ultimately in tetrapods. It is an informal presentation that I hope will stimulate discussion. It is not a formal paper with citations (although I do include a partial bibliography of p...

Rather than build detectors that process large amounts of data and then provide long lists of suspected sounds, detectors should be interactive with a user in such a way that the detector learns from the user and the user learns from the detector. The goal is to not only develop an accurate detector, but to obtain useful sound libraries and end-pro...

A preliminary description of sounds produced by three species of Pacific salmon was conducted to address the lack of quantified call characteristics in previous studies. Wild Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha), pink salmon (O. gorbuscha), and coho salmon (O. kisutch) were diverted from a natural spawning migration in the Big Qualicum River l...

Haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus) are important commercial resources in the western North Atlantic. Their distribution ranges from Newfoundland to North Carolina and are most abundant on Georges Bank and in the Gulf of Maine. Over the course of a decade, the Gulf of Maine warmed faster than 99% of the global ocean and these changes are likely to i...

Active fish sound production is geographically and taxonomically widespread—though not homogenous—among fishes, including numerous commercially and recreationally important fisheries species. Despite the ecological importance of fish sounds, their passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) applications, and extensive endeavors to document them, the field of...

Archived soundscape data from Lake Champlain, New York, were used to examine the effect of anthropogenic sounds produced by recreational boating on freshwater drum (Aplodinotus grunniens) soniferous behavior. Drum progressed from sporadic calling during the day to calls that increasingly overlapped culminating in a chorus in the late afternoon and...

Rapid changes in the global distribution of walleye pollock (Gadus chalcogrammus) due to climate change have raised concerns of potential negative interactions with other Arctic and North Pacific fishes, particularly with the Arctic cod (Boreogadus saida). Since both walleye pollock and Arctic cod are known to be soniferous, passive acoustic monito...

Fish sound production is taxonomically and geographically widespread. Pro- duced actively or passively, acoustic contributions of fishes to aquatic soundscapes support a myriad of con- and hetero-specific interactions. Despite the ecological importance of fish sounds, the field of bioacoustics historically lacked a global inventory of fish species...

Even with widespread evidence of the ecological importance of fish sounds for signaling and communication, and an increasing awareness of the negative impacts of anthropogenic sound, research into fish sound production still faces ongoing challenges limiting growth. To acquire quantitative data on research into fish sounds and assess topics related...

Recent advancements in cabled ocean observatories have increased the quality and prevalence of underwater videos; this data enables the extraction of high-level biologically relevant information such as species' behaviours. Despite this increase in capability, most modern methods for the automatic interpretation of underwater videos focus only on t...

Acoustic characteristics of bubble production by an odontocete were documented for the first time. Bubble sounds produced by the Amazon river dolphin (Inia geoffrensis) were recorded incidentally as part of a survey of fish sounds in the Pacaya–Samiria National Reserve of Peru on six dates between 4 and 24 July 2012. Dolphins were observed to perio...

Sound production in fishes is vital to an array of behaviors including territorial defense, reproduction, and competitive feeding. Unfortunately, recent passive acoustic monitoring efforts are revealing the extent to which anthropogenic forces are altering aquatic soundscapes. Despite the importance of fish sounds, extensive endeavors to document t...

Increasing interest in the acquisition of biotic and abiotic resources from within the deep sea (e.g. fisheries, oil-gas extraction, and mining) urgently imposes the development of novel monitoring technologies, beyond the traditional vessel-assisted, time-consuming, high-cost sampling surveys. The implementation of permanent networks of seabed and...

Different studies suggest some social calls could be used in fish identification if their specificity is unambiguously assessed. Sounds of different populations of piranhas Serrasalmus maculatus Kner, 1858 were recorded to determine their homogeneity between rivers inside a single basin (Araguari and Grande River, upper Paraná River basin) and betw...

Global warming is predicted to profoundly impact ocean ecosystems. Fish behavior is an important indicator of changes in such marine environments. Thus, the automatic identification of key fish behavior in videos represents a much needed tool for marine researchers, enabling them to study climate change-related phenomena. We offer a dataset of sabl...

Workshop presentation for "Movement Tracks for the Automatic Detection of Fish Behavior in Videos" NeurIPS 2020 Workshop Paper #36 Abstract: Global warming is predicted to profoundly impact ocean ecosystems. Fish behavior is an important indicator of changes in such marine environments. Thus, the automatic identification of key fish behavior in vi...

Global warming is predicted to profoundly impact ocean ecosystems. Fish behavior is an important indicator of changes in such marine environments. Thus, the automatic identification of key fish behavior in videos represents a much needed tool for marine researchers, enabling them to study climate change-related phenomena. We offer a dataset of sabl...

Seafloor multiparametric fibre-optic-cabled video observatories are emerging tools for standardized monitoring programmes, dedicated to the production of real-time fishery-independent stock assessment data. Here, we propose that a network of cabled cameras can be set up and optimized to ensure representative long-term monitoring of target commercia...

Spreadsheet of summary information on fish sounds recorded by Marie Fish and others in the book as well as earlier related publications. This was part of the information used in "Rountree, R.A., P.J. Perkins, R.D. Kenney, and K.R. Hinga. 2002. Sounds of Western North Atlantic Fishes: Data rescue. Bioacoustics 12(2/3):242-244" Note there are multip...

Rodney Rountree, The Fish Listener Current ROV and AUV instruments are poorly designed for behavioral ecology studies. They are designed for continued movement with the capability of hoovering for short periods, but only by using continuous propulsion. Operation without lights is also difficult for ROVs. Crawlers have the ability to maintain posi...

A “Passive Acoustic Monitoring” (PAM) survey of haddock sounds was conducted in collaboration with commercial fishers in the inshore regions of the Gulf of Maine (GOM) during 2003-2004 and 2006-2007 using bottom mounted “Autonomous Underwater Listening Stations” (AULS). Haddock sounds were observed in 34 of 59 deployments, however call rates were h...

Sablefish sounds, named rasps, were recorded at two captive facilities in British Columbia and Washington State. Rasps consisted of highly variable broadband trains of 2 to 336 ticks that lasted between 74 and 10 500 ms. The 260 rasps that were measured contained frequencies between 344 and 34 000 Hz with an average peak frequency of 3409 Hz. The f...

Abstract: Four operational factors, together with high development cost, currently limit the use of ocean observatories in ecological and fisheries applications: 1) limited spatial coverage; 2) limited integration of multiple types of technologies; 3) limitations in the experimental design for in situ studies; and 4) potential unpredicted bias in m...

Example of freshwater fish sounds recorded by the senior author

Review of literature on freshwater fish sounds in North America and Europe.

This bibliography constitutes my notes for several papers I have been working on for some time. Please take it as a very informal document that may be of some interest to those just getting interested in the literature of fish sounds. However, as these were my notes for specific papers, it is certainly not comprehensive, and many of the papers are...

The soundscape composition of freshwater habitats is poorly understood. Our goal was to document the occurrence of biological sounds in a large variety of freshwater habitats over a large geographic area. The underwater soundscape was sampled in freshwater habitat categorized as brook/creek, pond/lake, or river, from five major river systems in Nor...

Increasing interest in the acquisition of biotic and abiotic resources from within the deep sea (e.g. fisheries, oil-gas extraction, and mining) urgently imposes the development of novel monitoring technologies, beyond the traditional vessel-assisted, time-consuming, high-cost sampling surveys. The implementation of permanent networks of seabed and...

The recovery of cormorant populations in Europe and North America caused controversial debates between resource users and nature conservationists; demands to control populations have been expressed in several occasions by the fishery sector. Yet, control strategies in most cases are rarely more than ad hoc efforts to appease fishermen and anglers;...

We assess the impact of recreational boat traffic on sensitive habitats in the Western Mediterranean using passive acoustics. We compared underwater sounds in three regulated mooring locations vs a pristine location; and temporal differences in the pristine location vs the nearest mooring between high and low touristic seasons. We measured the numb...

In order to identify fish sounds in British Columbia soundscapes, we need catalogues of validated fish sounds from Pacific species. These catalogues will help in comparing validated examples to unknown sounds found in long-term autonomous recordings. In addition, it is important that the sounds be described quantitatively for accurate identificatio...

Brown trout sound production behavior. Movie of brown trout behavior during production of the sound series shown in Fig 7A. (MP4)

Brown trout behavior in slow motion. Movie of brown trout behavior during production of the sound series shown in Fig 7A. Video slowed to half speed to clarify the relationship between bubble release and sound production. (AVI)

Alewife bubble release. Movie of alewife behavior and bubble release in which only weak bubble sounds were acoustically detected (compare with S1 Video). (WMV)

Attributed atlantic salmon sounds. Recording of unknown salmonid sound series shown in Fig 9A. Sounds from the unknown salmonid are provisionally attributed to Atlantic salmon. (WAV)

Raw measurement data. Data file containing acoustic measurements for each sound and sound series. Data compiled from Raven Pro 1.5 acoustic software [11] selection tables and edited for clarity. (XLS)

Alewife sounds. Recording of alewife sound series shown in Fig 2A. (WAV)

Alewife sound production behavior. Movie of alewife behavior while producing the sound series shown in Fig 2A. (MP4)

White sucker sounds. Recording of white sucker sound series shown in Fig 5A. (WAV)

Brook trout sounds. Recording of brook trout sound series shown in Fig 6A. (WAV)

Brown trout sounds. Recording of brown trout sound series shown in Fig 7A. (WAV)

Detailed methodology. Detailed description of sampling locations and methods. (DOCX)

Alewife behavior in slow motion. Movie of alewife behavior while producing the sound series shown in Fig 2A. The video is slowed to half speed to clarify behavior and the relationship between sounds and bubble release. (AVI)

Alewife bubble release in slow motion. Movie of alewife behavior and bubble release in which only weak bubble sounds were acoustically detected. Video slowed to half speed to clarify behavior and sounds at the time of bubble release (compare with S3 Video). (AVI)

Brook trout sound production behavior. Movie of brown trout behavior during bubble release when fish sounds were not detected. (WMV)

Rainbow trout sounds. Recording of rainbow trout sound series shown in Fig 8A. (WAV)

• Passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) can be an effective tool in the identification of fishes and mapping of their temporal and spatial distribution patterns and thereby aids in ecosystem management in remote locations. However, to date measurements of the acoustic properties of piranha have been primarily made in aquaria on captive specimens obtain...

The underwater soundscape of an upper tributary of the Amazon River was studied in a four-week survey from 3 to 26 July 2012 within the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve, Peru. Over 550 individuals representing over 70 species of fishes were auditioned for sound production. In addition, over 641 minutes of natural sounds from the river were recorded...

Sounds produced by Arctic cod were recorded for the first time and suggest passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) can be an effective additional tool for the study and management of the species. Each of the 38 calls detected in three different aquatic facilities consisted of a single grunt with 6 to 12 pulses and a mean duration of 289 ms. Call frequenc...

Although many fish are soniferous, few of their sounds have been identified, making passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) ineffective. To start addressing this issue, a portable 6-hydrophone array combined with a video camera was assembled to catalog fish sounds in the wild. Sounds are detected automatically in the acoustic recordings and localized in...

Haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus) are present on both sides of the North Atlantic. Their distribution in the Northwest Atlantic ranges from Greenland to North Carolina. They are an important food resource that needs to be closely monitored to ensure a sustainable fishery. Research studies have reported that both male and female haddock produce sou...

We conducted a preliminary passive acoustic survey of the occurrence of freshwater drum, Aplodinotus grunniens, in the New York State Canal System (NYSCS) to demonstrate the usefulness of underwater sound monitoring in invasive species studies. Data from known populations of freshwater drum in Dale Hollow Reservoir and J. Percy Priest Lake in Tenne...

Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) is increasingly used as a method to characterize underwatersoundscapes and the impacts of noise on marine ecosystems. The natural sounds produced by marine mammals have been widely studied, enabling the use of PAM as an effective conservation tool. However, much less is known about fish sound production, particular...

We conducted a preliminary passive acoustic survey of the occurrence of freshwater drum in the New York State Canal System (NYSCS). Similar to more well studied marine members of the Sciaenidae, freshwater drum calls are composed of highly variable trains of 1 to 119 knocks/call (mean = 25 knocks/call), a mean knock period of 33 knocks/s, mean peak...

We conducted a roving survey of five major river systems and adjacent, creek, lake, and pond habitats located within the northeastern United States. Fish sounds were recorded in 49% of 175 locations. Air movement sounds, including fast repetitive tick (FRT), occurred at 41% of the locations. Sluggish creeks had the highest occurrence of fish sounds...

Passive acoustic monitoring of fish in their natural environment is a research field of growing interest and importance. Although many fish species are soniferous, the characterization and biological understanding of their sounds are largely unknown. Many underwater acoustic recordings contain sounds likely produced by fish, but little information...

We have conducted several studies of haddock sounds in the Gulf of Maine (GOM) with mixed results. An analysis of an archival recording from captive haddock brood stock made in 1970 found that the “spawning rumble” sound occurred variously at the end of short thump trains, in the middle of thump trains, or in isolation. Interestingly, haddock were...

We investigated the potential to use passive acoustics to access the impact of recreational boat mooring areas on ecologically sensitive habitats in the Western Mediterranean. One important consequence of the tourist industry in the region is that it targets the most pristine and ecologically sensitive habitats. Underwater sounds were recorded in m...

Underwater noise from anthropogenic sources has been increasing dramatically for the past few decades and little is known about its effects on fishes. The objective of this study is to describe the occurrence and characteristics of fish sounds in the SGaan Kinghlas-Bowie Seamount Marine Protected Area (SK-B MPA, British Columbia, Canada) and to cor...

Arctic charr Salvelinus alpinus did not appear to invest in acoustic communication during courtship and agonistic interactions in captivity. Salvelinus alpinus did, however, produce four different types of sounds which were found to be associated with three different types of air exchange behaviours which probably have a swimbladder regulation func...

NEPTUNE Canada is a cabled ocean observatory system containing five nodes located in the northeast Pacific Ocean. Using passive acoustic data recorded at two nodes (Folger Passage Deep and Barkley Canyon Axis) between June 2010 and May 2011, we sought to quantify the levels of vessel traffic and the occurrence of biological sounds to determine the...

Eighteen fish aggregation devices (FADs) of three sizes were deployed in 14 m of water off South Carolina. Eighty-nine fish counts at FADs were made in eight SCUBA surveys from May through November 1985. FADs were used as a tool to attract schooling planktivorous fishes in order to make in situ observations of schooling behavior. The behavior, spat...

Lots of people ask me about PAM sampling methods so I put together excerpts from various seminars to provide tips to anyone new to the field that is interested in recording fish sounds, and habitat soundscapes, in the field.

This update includes a correction to one of the citations. Vsn4 is the latest data.

We studied a population of Haddock Melanogrammus aeglefinus in the Gulf of Maine to determine whether it exhibits diel spawning periodicity. Commercial fishing vessels were chartered for 25 dedicated long-lining trips to collect sexually mature Haddock in the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary at locations identified by commercial fishers as...

Our understanding of the significance of sound production to the ecology of deep-sea fish communities has improved little since anatomical surveys in the 1950s first suggested that sound production is widespread among slope-water fishes. The recent implementation of cabled ocean observatory networks around the world that include passive acoustic re...

We build on recent efforts to standardize maturation staging methods through the development of a field-proof macroscopic ovarian maturity index for Haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus) for studies on diel spawning periodicity. A comparison of field and histological observations helped us to improve the field index and methods, and provided useful in...

Our understanding of the significance of sound production to the ecology of deep-sea fish communities has improved little since anatomical surveys in the 1950’s first suggested that sound production is widespread among slope-water fishes. The recent implementation of cabled ocean observatory networks around the world that include passive acoustic r...

Direct observation of wild Amazonian manatees (Trichechus inunguis) is almost impossible due to low water visibility and the cryptic behavior of the animals. Alternative non-invasive methods are needed to monitor populations of this endangered species. Trichechus inunguis is known to emit sounds in captivity. Intraspecific call differences potentia...

Direct observation of wild Amazonian manatees (Trichechus inunguis) is almost impossible due to low water visibility (<1m) and the cryptic behavior of the animals that became extremely shy after centuries of hunting (Best 1982, 1984). Alternative non-invasive methods are needed to monitor populations of this endangered species, which is both endemi...

Knowledge of relationships between predator size and prey size are needed to describe interactions of species and size classes in foodwebs.Most estimates of predator and prey sizes have been based on dietary studies and apply to small numbers of species in a relatively narrowsize range. These estimatesmay ormay not be representative of values for o...

The interaction between body size, habitat complexity and interstice width on habitat preference of age-0 and -1 year Pseudopleuronectes americanus was examined using continuous remote video observation. The habitat choices of juvenile P. americanus were recorded over a 6 h period in tanks with four treatments: bare sand, sand with low complexity c...

Over 50 years ago N.B. Marshall of the British Museum of Natural History hypothesized that biological sound production by fishes is widespread in the deep sea based on anatomical studies (Marshall 1954; 1967). Since that time only a handful of studies have reported observations of possible sound production by deep-sea fishes based on acoustic recor...

Written by: Rodney Rountree in Issue 5 January 2012 0 Comments Shore based passive acoustic survey uses a laptop to capture sounds received from a calibrated hydrophone A new field of passive acoustics is rapidly emerging in marine and aquatic ecology, in which scientists use underwater technology to listen in on the noisy aquatic realm. Listen to...

There is a strong need for improved sound source localization software for use by scientist interested in conducting passive acoustic surveys of marine and aquatic habitats where most biological sounds are currently unidentified. Fish sounds are typically low frequency (50-1200 Hz), narrow band, knock trains, short duration grunts, or tones, and ca...

Regime shifts in ecosystems whose patterns and properties may be very complex and thus manifold have profound implications for sustainability. Detecting structural breaks in natural processes, however, turns out to be an ambitious task because the lack of well defined target values and reference periods renders application of standard statistical (...

Every generation looks for an inspiration, a goal, a challenge to strive for that does not necessarily arise out of some dire necessity. Instead of just focusing on Green Energy benefits of offshore developments, how about embracing ocean observation science? How about promoting offshore wind farm development as a dramatic new human presence in the...

Sound sample for Brosme Brosme recorded on Stellwagen Bank, Gulf of Maine, USA. See movie and sound files from the study at: http://www.fishecology.org/soniferous/stellwagen.htm

Underwater sound and video observations were made at noon, sunset, and midnight in sand, gravel, and boulder habitat in the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, Gulf of Maine, USA in October 2001 using a remotely operated vehicle (ROV). Seventeen species of fish and squid were observed with clear habitat and time differences. Observations of...

We propose a hypothetical visual field overlap (VFO) model for shoaling behavior. While solitary individuals have the disadvantage of a substantial blind zone to their rear, the overlapping visual fields among shoal members allows the shoal to collectively view nearly 360°. A highly polarized shoal (i.e., a school) would be less advantageous than r...