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PhD Studentship at the University of Edinburgh
Supervisors: Dr Victoria Braithwaite & Dr Lynne Sneddon
Improving the welfare of farmed and wild fish
A common practice to enhance recreational and commercial fisheries is the
release of hatchery reared fish into streams, rivers and lakes. Typically
very large numbers of these released fish die. More surprisingly, however,
recent evidence is now suggesting that the increased size and aggressiveness
of the surviving hatchery reared fish is having detrimental effects on the
natural wild populations. Hatchery reared fish are forced, through their
rearing conditions, to become aggressive competitors and work has recently
found that natural wild fish can be out-competed and forced out of their
home territory by hatchery fish.
The goals of this studentship will be to determine whether simple, cost
effective alterations to existing practises can improve the welfare of both
the hatchery and the natural wild populations of fish.:
· Improve the ability of the hatchery fish to survive when released.
· Produce hatchery fish with lower aggressiveness.
· Determine whether these hatchery reared fish would be less of a threat to
natural wild populations.
The alterations to the hatchery rearing conditions will need to be simple
and cost effective if they are to be adopted by fisheries. To try to
increase survivorship, experiments will be designed where brown trout (a
fish commonly reared in hatcheries and used to enhance, preserve or
re-establish threatened populations) will be reared under a range of
environmental conditions to expose them to variable substrates and levels of
flow. It has been suggested that hatchery fish frequently select
unfavourable habitats and perish through an inability to find sufficient
food. If the fish are given the opportunity to learn basic facts about
variable environment this should increase their survivorship. Work will also
determine whether different feeding regimes, such as unpredictable feeding
times and multiple feeding locations will reduce the aggressiveness of
hatchery fish.
Fish reared under these different types of condition will be behaviourally
screened to compare their aggressiveness and competitive ability with wild
caught trout. Finally, such reared fish will be released into natural
systems and their survivorship and growth rate (weight gain) will be
compared with regularly hatchery reared and wild fish.
For more information about the Institute of Cell Animal and Population
Biology see: http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk/icapb/icapb.html. If you are
interested in the proposed research please send a covering letter outlining
why you are attracted to this area and a CV (with two named referees) to Dr
Victoria Braithwaite, ICAPB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh University, West
Mains Rd, Edinburgh EH9 3JT. E-mail: [log in to unmask] CLOSING DATE
FEBRUARY 11th 1999.
A successful candidate will be expected to start in October 2000 and will
either be funded by a UFAW scholarship (~£12,600 rising to ~£14,900) or a
BBSRC Case studentship (~£6,600pa rising to ~£7,100).
Lynne U. Sneddon,
Animal Welfare Research Group,
Roslin Institute,
Roslin,
Midlothian EH25 9PS
U.K.
Tel. No. +44 (0)131 527 4200
Fax +44 (0)131 440 0434
E-mail [log in to unmask]
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