I promised folks that I'd not let this blog go stagnant throughout the winter months, but I seem to not be holding up my end of the bargain. I'll use the old "I've been really busy" excuse here because, well, it's true.
One of the things that has kept me busy the last couple weeks is analyzing my data from this past summer. Below are a few of the more interesting findings:
1) Behaviourally, muskies show a significant difference in distance moved (between sequential tracking points) at immediate (2 hrs) time intervals than at 48 (short-term) and 1 week (long-term) time periods. This is likely simply reflecting recovery from the angling event.
2) Physiology wasn't a whole lot different between treatments, but when analyzed using temperature as a covariate (an additional variable that might have some influence on the main variable in question, in this case stress levels) I did find some differences. Cortisol (primary stress hormone) and glucose (energy stores released in response to increases in cortisol) were significantly greater in concentration at temperatures above 20C/68F than below.
For you folks down in the States that are skeptical of our results because we didn't angle very many fish from upper 70/80+F water temps, this trend should be of some consolation. You'll be pleased to hear that we will make every effort to angle fish during the warmest part of summer next year. We, unfortunately, did not get the hot summer weather last year that we might normally experience.
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Very interesting Sean - and good to see you haven't abandoned your fans ;-) Hopefully, we will have some warmer water temperatures for the study next summer - though I don't miss the heat and humidity!
ReplyDeleteI think that "Climate Change" would be a better description of the problems that have been termed "Global Warming". It's the weird extremes that have caused so much grief everywhere - including the Ottawa River. The last two winters have been WAY more snowy than usual and even a guy like me who hates HOT weather was left wondering how we missed summer last year. Bizarre. ... but it probably means I will be longing for cooler temperatures when we get a scorcher this summer!