Locomotory behaviour and physiology of fish: an evaluation of tradional protocols and development of new and improved methodologies

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In the past, researchers interested in the swimming ability of fish studied individuals that were placed in small "fish treadmills". Recent work has shown that these treadmills can cause fish to stop swimming before their muscles become exhausted, which means that fish behaviour is having an effect on the results of the research. This work will study why fish in treadmills stop swimming early, and what scientific principals may be flawed due to the previously unknown occurrence of behavioural fatigue. In addition, the fish treadmills are not very good for measuring high speed swimming, because they are too small for fish to use certain swimming modes that would normally save them energy. As such, we will be studying high speed swimming in long raceways, where fish have room to move and are free to use strategies that save energy, as they do in wild. It is expected that this information will be very useful, as it will be more applicable to wild fish in nature than data from the tests that force fish to swim in the small treadmills.