Meeting Abstract
Behavioral syndrome is a suite of correlated behaviors that are expressed within a given context (or across contexts) as correlations between activity levels and boldness in foraging and anti-predator contexts. Assessments of behavioral syndrome have suggested that some of these correlated behavioral traits such as boldness and activity, allow for comparisons in these traits between species in similar contexts. A species’ ability to invade novel habitats could be linked to some of these flexible correlated behaviors. This study looked at behavioral syndrome in fish species considered to be invasive or potentially invasive and species not considered to be invasive to determine if there is indeed a behavioral syndrome which appropriately characterizes “invasiveness”. Using validated tasks such as shelter latency and scototaxis, we determined species’ boldness in complex environments, exploratory behavior, latency to explore a novel environment, and activity in both a novel and familiar environment. Preliminary data suggests that species that are noninvasive are more active in a familiar environment (p<0.01) but seem to be less exploratory when in a novel or fearful environment (p<0.05). These results suggest that there are a series of correlated behavioral traits that can aid in invasion of novel ecosystems by fish species. While several studies have investigated morphological and physiological adaptations associated with invasive species, relatively few studies have examined the behavioral syndromes that may characterize these dangerous species.
