How do human activities impair the welfare of highly social fish?
Grantee: Joachim Frommen
Institutions: Manchester Metropolitan University, United Kingdom
Grant amount: $28,960
Grant type: Seed grants
Focal species: The princess of Zambia (Neolamprologus pulcher)
Conservation status: Least concern
Disciplines: Ichthyology, physiology, genetics/genomics
Research location: United Kingdom, Zambia
Project summary
This project will investigate the welfare of a common fish species in Lake Tanganyika, the princess cichlid (Neolamprologus pulcher), as they are exposed to varying levels of human activity. Across eight populations representing a range of distances to human settlements and shipping routes, the researchers will monitor behaviors indicative of stress or aggression, and measure body condition and the brain tissue expression of five genes involved in stress physiology (glucocorticoid response pathway; crf, cyp11b, gr1, gr2, mr). These welfare indicators will be compared with specific environmental characteristics, including boat noise, water visibility (sedimentary and algal load), human fishing intensity, temperature stress, and structural complexity of the local environment.
Why we funded this project
By focusing on an established model system (cichlids), this project is able to benefit from background knowledge of the species’ ecology and behavior and proceed to more neglected welfare questions, as well as potentially engaging a ready audience of cichlid researchers. An especially interesting component of this project is its investigation of brain gene expression to potentially better understand how stress physiology relates to an animal’s subjective experience.