Abstract
The reproductive biology of three yellow catfish congeners was studied in the Three Gorges Reservoir of the Yangtze River, China. We compared reproductive traits among the lentic, transitional, and lotic zones. A total of 4502 individuals of the three species was collected, and the sex ratio, size at 50% maturity, spawning season, fecundity, and egg size were determined. Results showed that populations inhabiting the lotic zone spawned earlier than those inhabiting the lentic zone. For the three species, fecundities were significantly higher for populations in the lotic zone than for those in the lentic and transitional zones (P < 0.05). Pelteobagrus vachelli (Richardson) and P. fulvidraco (Richardson) displayed an obvious trade-off between egg size and fecundity, whereas P. nitidus (Sauvage et Dabry) produced the largest eggs in the lotic zone. Sex ratios were significantly different among zones (P < 0.05, for each species), but the bias patterns were different. Sizes at 50% maturity of female P. nitidus and P. vachelli were the largest in the lotic zone and the smallest in the transitional zone, but was similar among zones for P. fulvidraco. Overall results suggest that the three yellow catfish species developed different reproductive traits among the three habitats in the TGR, whereas the variations reflected further interspecific differences. Our study indicates the importance of riverine habitats for the conservation of species of fish, even for species such as these eurytopic catfish inhabiting the upper reach of the Yangtze River. This study further suggests that species-specific responses should be considered when evaluating the influences of new hydropower projects, even for such closely related species of fish.
Highlights
Dams have been built for thousands of years and play important societal roles in irrigation, food production, recreation, flood management, electricity generation, and navigation [1, 2]
For P. vachelli, the sex ratios were significantly biased toward females in the lentic (χ2 = 4.18, P = 0.04) and lotic zones (χ2 = 4.93, P = 0.026) but not in the transitional zone (χ2 = 0.44, P = 0.506), whereas the ratios of P. nitidus were significantly biased toward females in the lentic zone (χ2 = 11.89, P < 0.05) but not in the transitional (χ2 = 0.49, P = 0.484) and lotic zones (χ2 = 0.09, P = 0.764) (Table 2)
Large differences were observed across the three zones in the Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR) for key reproductive traits, including the sex ratio, size at 50% maturity, spawning season, fecundity, and egg size of the three yellow catfish species
Summary
Dams have been built for thousands of years and play important societal roles in irrigation, food production, recreation, flood management, electricity generation, and navigation [1, 2]. Dams drastically alter freshwater ecosystems [3,4,5]. China Three Gorges Corporation Project (CT-1208-01), http://www.ctg.com.cn/sxjt/kjcx/_301965/ index.html, Zhongjie Li and Jiashou Liu; (4) The State Key Laboratory of Freshwater Ecology and Biotechnology (2014FBZ04), http://febl.ihb.cas.cn/, Jiashou Liu and Zhongjie Li; (5) USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (Hatch Project 230537), Brian R. Murphy; and (6) The Acorn Alcinda Foundation, Lewes, Delaware, USA, Brian R Murphy. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
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