The effect of sex and shoal size on shoaling behaviour in<i>Danio rerio</i>

Ruhl, Nathan; McRobert, Scott P.

doi:10.1111/j.0022-1112.2005.00826.x

Cited by 107 publications

(99 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The size and composition of the stimulus shoal are also important, and several features of shoal mates have been shown to also induce preferential responses in zebrafish, including sex and number of shoal members shown, sex ratio within the stimulus shoal, body size, stripe pattern, and pigmentation of stimulus fish (Kitevsky and Pyron, 2003;Ruhl and McRobert, 2005;Qin et al, 2014;Seguin & Gerlai, 2017;Seguin et al, unpublished results).…”

Section: The Effect Of Environmental Stimuli On Shoalingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The zebrafish as a promising tool for modeling human brain disorders: A review based upon an IBNS Symposium

Shams

Rihel

Ortíz

et al. 2018

Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews

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The zebrafish represents an excellent compromise between system complexity and practical simplicity, features that make it useful for modeling and mechanistic analysis of complex brain disorders. Also promising are screens for psychoactive drugs with effects on larval and adult zebrafish behavior. This review, based upon a recent symposium held at the 2016 IBNS Congress, provides different perspectives on how the zebrafish may be utilized to advance research into human central nervous system disorders. It starts with a discussion on an important bottleneck in zebrafish research, measuring the behavior of this species (specifically shoaling), and continues with examples on research on autism spectrum disorder in larval zebrafish, on screening natural products for compounds with psychoactive properties in adult zebrafish, and on the development of a zebrafish model of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. By providing information on a broad spectrum of brain disorders, experimental methods, and scientific approaches using both larval and adult zebrafish, the review is intended to showcase this underutilized laboratory species for behavioral neuroscience and psychopharmacology research.

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Section: The Effect Of Environmental Stimuli On Shoalingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The zebrafish as a promising tool for modeling human brain disorders: A review based upon an IBNS Symposium

Shams

Rihel

Ortíz

et al. 2018

Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Spawning occurred in the morning, when the fish dropped to the bottom and darted quickly over the substrate where they mated and deposited eggs (Hutter et al 2010). Although zebrafish are often described as ''broadcast spawners'' (Ruhl and McRobert 2005), such behaviour appears to be a laboratory artefact from studying fish in small, crowded aquaria (Hutter et al 2010). Zebrafish lack conspicuous sexual dimorphisms and the sexes are often not easy to distinguish, at least for humans; however, contrary to what is sometimes suggested (Pritchard et al 2001), they are not monomorphic.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This finding implies that females are more attuned to sex differences than males (at least for body shape); however, another study using actual fish for visual stimuli found the opposite result. When presented with shoals of zebrafish, males were more attracted to female over male shoals (Ruhl and McRobert 2005). However, because size was not controlled (on the contrary, females for the experiment were chosen by their distended abdomens), this result may have been due to males' preference for large females (Hutter et al 2010) rather than sex discrimination.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sex recognition in zebrafish (Danio rerio)

Hutter

Zala

Penn

2010

J Ethol

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We investigated sex recognition in female zebrafish (Danio rerio) to better understand the underlying sensory mechanisms and identify male secondary sexual traits. Females were simultaneously presented with two fish, a male and a female, in a flow-chamber apparatus, and females' relative attraction towards males was observed under different conditions. With domesticated fish, females were more attracted to males when presented with both visual and chemosensory cues from stimulus fish. They still discriminated the sexes when only visual cues were provided, but not when white ambient light was changed to yellow, indicating that colour plays a role. Sex discrimination under yellow light was improved when chemosensory cues were also provided. Surprisingly, females' attraction to males was not more pronounced in the morning when mating occurs. Domesticated females discriminated the sexes when presented with wild-derived, as well as domesticated fish, whereas wild-derived females did not show any biases for domesticated or wild-derived males. Behavioural observations indicated that the wildderived females were distressed, which explains their lack of attraction to males. In summary, domesticated female zebrafish discriminated the sexes using both visual (body colour) and olfactory cues; however, wild-derived zebrafish were too distressed for behavioural experiments under these laboratory conditions.

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“…When discriminating numbers above 4, ratios up to 0.5, e.g. 3 versus 6 or 5 versus 10 are differentiated by angelfish, Pterophyllum scalare (Gómez-Laplaza 2012), guppies (Piffer et al 2013) and zebrafish, Danio rerio (Ruhl and McRobert 2005). Mosquitofish, Gambusia affinis (Agrillo et al 2007), and three-spined sticklebacks, Gasterosteus aculeatus, are also shown to discriminate ratios of 0.66 (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantification acuity in spontaneous shoaling decisions of three-spined sticklebacks

et al. 2015

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The ability to discriminate between different quantities is widespread throughout the animal kingdom, and the underlying mechanisms of quantity discrimination are currently intensely discussed. In contrast, questions elucidating the limits of quantity estimation received rather little attention so far. Here, we examined fine-tuned quantity estimation in the three-spined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus) in a natural context, i.e. during shoaling decisions. Wild-caught focal fish were given the spontaneous choice between two shoals which differed in group size by 1 fish (0 vs. 1, 1 vs. 2, 2 vs. 3, 3 vs. 4, 4 vs. 5, 5 vs. 6 and 6 vs. 7), based on visual assessment. The results show that sticklebacks generally prefer to shoal with the larger group. They discriminated numerical contrasts up to 6 versus 7, equalling a numerical ratio of 0.86. Preference patterns followed Weber's law, i.e. decreased with increasing numerical ratio. This pattern was found across all numerical conditions as well as within the small number range (ranging from 1 vs. 2 to 3 vs. 4). The results suggest that wild-caught three-spined sticklebacks are spontaneously able (i.e. without prior learning) to detect subtle differences in shoal sizes. Further, they confirm findings of previous studies highlighting the contribution of the analogue magnitude system to quantity estimation in fishes.

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The effect of sex and shoal size on shoaling behaviour inDanio rerio

Cited by 107 publications

References 32 publications

The zebrafish as a promising tool for modeling human brain disorders: A review based upon an IBNS Symposium

The zebrafish as a promising tool for modeling human brain disorders: A review based upon an IBNS Symposium

Sex recognition in zebrafish (Danio rerio)

Quantification acuity in spontaneous shoaling decisions of three-spined sticklebacks

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