Foraging efficiencies on drifting and benthic prey in juvenile salmonids - effect of light

Sammanfattning: Stream living salmonids are generally regarded as drift feeders that rely upon their vision when foraging. It has been shown that salmonids become nocturnal at low water temperatures, but have a low foraging efficiency as light intensity is low, due to their dependence upon vision. Shifting from drift feeding to benthic feeding, has been suggested, and analyses of gut contents during winter have shown that the diet of salmonids mainly consists of benthic invertebrates. Most experimental studies of salmonid foraging have only offered the fish drifting prey or only given the fish access to benthic prey in total darkness. Such conditions rarely occur in nature and the importance of benthic foraging to salmonids may therefore have been underestimated. In this study I conducted a stream laboratory experiment to test if low light intensity caused juvenile Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and brown trout (Salmo trutta) (age 0+) to forage more on benthic than drifting prey. The salmon foraged on both drifting and benthic prey during high light but consumed only benthic prey during low light (by one of six fish). Trout foraged on both drifting and benthic prey during both high and low light, but foraging efficiency was lower during low than high light and foraging efficiency was lower for benthic prey than for drifting prey. These results indicate that both species forage more opportunistically than previously thought.