Interactions between water depth, velocity and body size on fish swimming performance: Implications for culvert hydrodynamics

Understanding how fish traverse man-made barriers (e.g. road-crossings and culverts) ensures that engineering and design guidelines achieve positive outcomes for fish communities. Water velocity, depth and fish body size are interrelated factors that influence fish passage through culverts. Velocity...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Ecological engineering Vol. 156; p. 105987
Main Authors:	Shiau, Jenny, Watson, Jabin R., Cramp, Rebecca L., Gordos, Matthew A., Franklin, Craig E.
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	Amsterdam Elsevier B.V 01-09-2020 Elsevier BV
Subjects:	Anthropogenic barriers Bidyanus bidyanus Body shape Body size Catadromous fishes Catfish Culvert Culverts Design criteria Eel-tailed catfish Eels Fish Fish barriers Fish ladders Fish passage Fishways Fluid dynamics Fluid flow Flumes Freshwater fishes Hydrodynamics Indigenous species Juveniles Maccullochella peelii Marine fishes Murray cod Probability theory Shallow water Silver perch Success Swimming Swimming endurance Tandanus tandanus Traversability Velocity Water depth Water velocity Maccullochella peelii Bidyanus bidyanus Murray cod Tandanus tandanus Silver perch Traversability Eel-tailed catfish Swimming endurance Culvert Fish passage Anthropogenic barriers
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Summary:	Understanding how fish traverse man-made barriers (e.g. road-crossings and culverts) ensures that engineering and design guidelines achieve positive outcomes for fish communities. Water velocity, depth and fish body size are interrelated factors that influence fish passage through culverts. Velocity barriers have been a major focus of culvert remediation efforts to improve fish passage, however wide culvert designs that aim to limit high water velocities, often create shallow depths in the culvert barrel that can potentially impede fish passage. Here, we quantified how water velocity, depth and body size interact to affect fish swimming performance and their ability to traverse a 12 m culvert-scale swimming channel. Juveniles and sub-adults of three large-bodied native Australian fish species, silver perch (Bidyanus bidyanus), Murray cod (Maccullochella peelii) and eel-tail catfish (Tandanus tandanus), were chosen to represent a range of body shapes, swimming styles and capabilities. Each species was swum in nine treatments, consisting of three velocities at three water depths, with their time to fatigue and traverse success rates over 8 m of flume length quantified. We found that B. bidyanus had an exceptional probability of traverse success, with larger individuals traversing faster than smaller sized fish, but they were physically hindered by shallow water depths. The interaction between velocity and depth was non-linear and highly affected the swimming performance and traverse success of M. peelii and T. tandanus, particularly for fish >250 mm and < 100 mm. Our results demonstrate the importance of considering size class and species-specific swimming capabilities in culvert design criteria.
ISSN:	0925-8574 1872-6992
DOI:	10.1016/j.ecoleng.2020.105987