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Oxythermal window drastically constraints the survival and development of European sturgeon early life phases

  • Multi-Stressors in Freshwater and Transitional Environments: from Legacy Pollutants to Emerging Ones
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Abstract

European sturgeon Acipenser sturio is an anadromous fish species being classified “critically endangered” with only one remaining population in the Gironde-Garonne-Dordogne basin (France). In the global warming context, this paper aims to determine the sensitivity of A. sturio early life phases to temperature and oxygen saturation. Embryos were experimentally exposed to a combination of temperature (12 to 30 °C) and oxygen (30 to 90% O2 saturation) conditions. Lethal and sublethal effects were evaluated using embryonic mortality, hatching success, malformation rate, yolk sac resorption, tissue development and swimming speed. Embryonic survival peaked at 20 °C and no survival was recorded at 30 °C regardless of the associated oxygen saturation. No hatching occurred at 50% O2 sat or below regardless of temperature. Malformation frequency appeared to be minimum at 20 °C and 90% O2 sat. Swimming speed peaked at 16 °C. The temperature optimum of early life phases of A. sturio was determined to be close to 20 °C. Its upper tolerance limit is between 26 and 30 °C and its lower tolerance limit is below 12 °C. Oxygen depletion induces sublethal effects at 70% O2 sat and lethal effects at 50% O2 sat. Within the spawning period in the Gironde-Garonne-Dordogne basin, we identified yearly favourable oxythermal windows. Consequences of climate change would depend of the phenological adaptation of the species for its spawning period.

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Notes

  1. R Development Core Team (2014). R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. ISBN 3-900051-07-0, URL: http://www.R-project.org.

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Acknowledgements

This study was carried out as part of the Cluster of Excellence COTE. Temperature and Oxygen data from the field were provided by the NGO Migrateurs Garonne Dordogne (MIGADO) (http://www.migado.fr/) and the consortium MAGEST. The English has been revised by James Emery. Thanks to David Mc Kenzie and Patrick Kestemont for reviewing a previous version of this text in the PhD manuscript of Nicolas Delage and two anonymous reviewers.

Funding

This study was funded by the Région Aquitaine, IRSTEA and the French National Research Agency (SturTOP research project No. ANR-13-CESA-0018-01).

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Author notes

  1. Nicolas Delage

    Present address: Agence Française de la Biodiversité, Pôle Gest’Aqua, 65 rue de St Brieuc, 35042, Rennes Cedex, France

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IRSTEA EABX, Aquatic Ecosystems and Global Changes Research Unit, 50 Avenue de Verdun, 33612, Cestas, France

    Nicolas Delage, Blandine Couturier, Philippe Jatteau & Eric Rochard

  2. University of Bordeaux, UMR CNRS EPOC 5805, Allée Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire - CS 50023, 33615, Pessac Cedex, France

    Nicolas Delage & Jérôme Cachot

  3. INRA,UMR 703 APEX, Oniris La Chantrerie, Nantes, France

    Thibaut Larcher, Mireille Ledevin & Hélicia Goubin

  4. LUNAM Université, École nationale vétérinaire, agro-alimentaire et de l’alimentation Nantes-atlantique (Oniris), Nantes, France

    Thibaut Larcher, Mireille Ledevin & Hélicia Goubin

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Delage, N., Couturier, B., Jatteau, P. et al. Oxythermal window drastically constraints the survival and development of European sturgeon early life phases. Environ Sci Pollut Res 27, 3651–3660 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-018-4021-8

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