The role of behavioural measures in successful fishway passage during seasonal brown trout (Salmo trutta) migration.

Authors

Nikola Kofentová, Pavel Horký, Tereza Valchářová, Ondřej Slavík

Published in

Journal of fish biology. Aug 12, 2026. Epub Aug 12, 2026.

Abstract

Successfully overcoming lateral barriers in rivers is crucial for longitudinal fish migration and is influenced mainly by fishway design, environmental variability and/or individual behavioural traits. Although behavioural traits are well studied in many contexts, their role in predicting fishway passage success in the wild remains poorly understood. In a one-year study (Úhlava River, Elbe catchment area, Czech Republic), we analysed the behavioural measures of 60 adult brown trout (Salmo trutta) and observed their seasonal migrations including passage through a bypass fishway. Wild brown trout were captured in the river upstream of a fishway, and their behavioural measures, for example, decision-making latency and indicators of laterality, were tested in an experimental T-maze. Individuals were thereafter tagged with transmitters equipped with temperature sensors and released into the river downstream of the fishway, and their movement activities were observed. Their positions were recorded weekly during the annual period. Overall, the fishway passage efficiency reached 73%, with higher success during the autumn. Individuals with higher movement activity were more successful at passing through the fishway. Passage probability was negatively related to flow rate and positively related to decision-making latency, indicating that individuals that took longer to solve the T-maze were more likely to pass. Rightward laterality-biased fish had significantly lower passage success than leftward laterality-biased or non-responding fish did. Moreover, rightward laterality-biased fish lacked the negative relationship between preferred temperature and movement activity observed in leftward laterality-biased and non-responding fish, indicating a possible disruption of the behavioural syndrome. Although the studied fishway proved generally effective, our results tend to show a selective impact on the local trout population when behavioural measures are considered.

PMID:
42586768
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 13 Aug 2026.

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