Passive acoustic monitoring for assessment of natural and anthropogenic sound sources in the marine environment using automatic recognition

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Publications

Vocal rhythms in nesting Lusitanian toadfish, Halobatrachus didactylus

Publication . Vieira, Manuel; Amorim, Maria Clara P; Fonseca, Paulo

Males of several fish species aggregate and vocalize together, increasing the detection range of the sounds and their chances of mating. In the Lusitanian toadfish (Halobatrachus didactylus), breeding males build nests under rocks in close proximity and produce hundreds of boatwhistles (BW) an hour to attract females to lay their demersal eggs on their nests. Chorusing behaviour includes fine-scale interactions between individuals, a behavioural dynamic worth investigating in this highly vocal fish. Here we present a study to further investigate this species’ vocal temporal patterns on a fine (individual rhythms and male-male interactions) and large (chorus daily patterns) scales. Several datasets recorded in the Tagus estuary were labelled with the support of an automatic recognition system based on hidden Markov models. Fine-scale vocal temporal patterns exhibit high variability between and within individuals, varying from an almost isochronous to an apparent aperiodic pattern. When in a chorus, males exhibited alternation or synchrony calling patterns, possibly depending on motivation and social context (mating or male-male competition). When engaged in sustained calling, males usually alternated vocalizations with their close neighbours thus avoiding superposition of calls. Synchrony was observed mostly in fish with lower mean calling rate. Interaction patterns were less obvious in more distanced males. Daily choruses showed periods with several active calling males and periods of low activity with no significant diel patterns in shallower intertidal waters. Here, chorusing activity was mainly affected by tide level. In contrast, at a deeper location, although tidal currents causes a decrease in calling rate, tide level did not significantly influence calling, and there was a higher calling rate at night. These data show that photoperiod and tide levels can influence broad patterns of Lusitanian toadfish calling activity as in other shallow-water fishes, but fine temporal patterns in acoustic interactions among nesting males is more complex than previously known for fishes.

2021Journal article

Open access

Boat noise impacts Lusitanian toadfish breeding males and reproductive outcome

Publication . Amorim, Maria Clara P; Vieira, Manuel; Meireles, Gabriela; Novais, Sara C; Lemos, Marco F.L.; Modesto, Teresa; Alves, Daniel; Zuazu, Ana; Lopes, Ana F.; Matos, André B.; Fonseca, Paulo J.

Anthropogenic noise is a growing threat to marine organisms, including fish. Yet very few studies have addressed the impact of anthropogenic noise on fish reproduction, especially in situ. In this study, we investigated the impacts of boat noise exposure in the reproductive success of wild Lusitanian toadfish (Halobatrachus didactylus), a species that relies on advertisement calls for mate attraction, using behavioural, physiological and reproductive endpoints. Two sets of artificial nests were deployed in the Tagus estuary and exposed to either ambient sound or boat noise during their breeding season. Toadfish males spontaneously used these nests to breed. We inspected nests for occupation and the presence of eggs in six spring low tides (in two years) and assessed male vocal activity and stress responses. Boat noise did not affect nest occupation by males but impacted reproductive success by decreasing the likelihood of receiving eggs, decreasing the number of live eggs and increasing the number of dead eggs, compared to control males. Treatment males also showed depressed vocal activity and slightly higher cortisol levels. The assessment of oxidative stress and energy metabolism-related biomarkers revealed no oxidative damage in noise exposed males despite having lower antioxidant responses and pointed towards a decrease in the activity levels of energy metabolism-related biomarkers. These results suggest that males exposed to boat noise depressed their metabolism and their activity (such as parental care and mate attraction) to cope with an acoustic stressor, consistent with a freezing defensive response/behaviour. Together, our study demonstrates that boat noise has severe impacts on reproductive fitness in Lusitanian toadfish. We argue that, at least fishes that cannot easily avoid noise sources due to their dependence on specific spawning sites, may incur in significant direct fitness costs due to chronic noise exposure.

2022Journal article

Open access

Fish sounds and boat noise are prominent soundscape contributors in an urban European estuary

Publication . Vieira, Manuel; Fonseca, Paulo; Amorim, Maria Clara P

Passive acoustic monitoring is a valuable tool for non-intrusive monitoring of marine environments, also allowing the assessment of underwater noise that can negatively affect marine organisms. Here we provide for the first time, an assessment of noise levels and temporal soundscape patterns for a European estuary. We used several eco-acoustics methodologies to characterize the data collected over six weeks within May 2016 - July 2017 from Tagus estuary. Biophony was the major contributor dominated by fish vocalizations and the main driver for seasonal patterns. Maritime traffic was the major source of anthropogenic noise, with daily patterns monitored using 1584 Hz third-octave band level. This indicator avoided biophony and geophony, unlike other indicators proposed for the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Furthermore, the frequency overlap between anthropophony and biophony demands precautionary actions and calls for further research. This study provides an assessment that will be useful for future monitoring and management strategies.

2021Journal article

Open access

Sound production in the Meagre, Argyrosomus regius (Asso, 1801): intraspecific variability associated with size, sex and context

Publication . Pereira, David; Vieira, Manuel; Pousão-Ferreira, Pedro; Candeias-Mendes, Ana; Barata, Marisa; Fonseca, Paulo; Amorim, Maria Clara Pessoa

Many fish taxa produce sound in voluntary and in disturbance contexts but information on the full acoustic repertoire is lacking for most species. Yet, this knowledge is critical to enable monitoring fish populations in nature through acoustic monitoring.

2020Journal article

Open access

Boat noise impacts early life stages in the Lusitanian toadfish: A field experiment

Publication . Faria, A.; Fonseca, P.J.; Vieira, M.; Alves, L.M.F.; Lemos, M.F.L.; Novais, S.C.; Matos, A.B.; Vieira, D.; Amorim, M.C.P.

Marine traffic is themost common and chronic source of ocean noise pollution. Despite the evidence of detrimental effects of noise exposure on fish, knowledge about the effects on the critical early life stages - embryos and larvae - is still scarce. Here, we take a natural habitat-based approach to examine potential impacts of boat noise exposure in early life stages in a wild fish population of the Lusitanian toadfish (Halobatrachus didactylus). In-situ experiments were carried out in the Tagus estuary, an estuary with significant commercial and recreational boat traffic. Nestswith eggswere exposed to either ambient (control) or boat noise (treatment), for 1 fortnight. Eggs were photographed before being assigned to each treatment, and after exposure, to count number of eggs and/or larvae to assess survival, and sampled to study development and oxidative stress and energy metabolism-related biomarkers. Data concerns 4 sampling periods (fortnights) from 2 years. Results indicate that offspring survival did not differ between treatments, but boat noise induced a detrimental effect on embryos and larvae stress response, and on larvae development. Embryos showed reduced levels of electron transport system (ETS), an energy metabolism-related biomarker, while larvae showed higher overall stress responses, with increased levels of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and DNA damage (oxidative stress related responses), ETS, and reduced growth. With this study,we provided the first evidence of detrimental effects of boat noise exposure on fish development in the field and on stress biomarker responses. If these critical early stages are not able to compensate and/or acclimate to the noise stress later in the ontogeny, then anthropogenic noise has the potential to severely affect this and likely other marine fishes, with further consequences for populations resilience and dynamics.

2021Journal article

Open access