CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 33Marine animal studies overviewAnimal Vocal Communication and BehaviorFreshwater macroinvertebrate diversity and ecology

The role of freshwater bioacoustics in ecological research

Open access
Greenhalgh, Jack A., Genner, Martin J., Jones, Gareth, Desjonquères, Camille·2020·WIREs Water
DOI 10.1002/wat2.1416
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

Conventional methodologies used to estimate biodiversity in freshwater ecosystems can be nonselective and invasive, sometimes leading to capture and potential injury of vulnerable species. Therefore, interest in noninvasive surveying techniques is growing among freshwater ecologists. Passive acoustic monitoring, the noninvasive recording of environmental sounds, has been shown to effectively survey biota in terrestrial and marine ecosystems. However, knowledge of the sounds produced by freshwater species is relatively scarce. Furthermore, little is known about the representation of different freshwater taxonomic groups and habitat types within the literature. Here we present results of a systematic review of research literature on freshwater bioacoustics and identify promising areas of future research. The review showed that fish are the focal taxonomic group in 44% of published studies and were studied primarily in laboratory aquaria and lotic habitats. By contrast, lentic habitats and other taxonomic groups have received relatively little research interest. It is particularly striking that arthropods are only represented by 26% of studies, despite their significant contributions to freshwater soundscapes. This indicates a mismatch between the representation of taxonomic groups within the freshwater bioacoustic literature and their relative acoustic contribution to natural freshwater soundscapes. In addition, the review indicates an ongoing shift from behavioral studies, often with focus on a single taxonomic group, towards field‐based studies using ecoacoustic approaches. On the basis of this review we suggest that future freshwater bioacoustics research should focus on passive acoustic monitoring and arthropod sound, which would likely yield novel insights into freshwater ecosystem function and condition. This article is categorized under: Water and Life > Nature of Freshwater Ecosystems Water and Life > Conservation, Management, and Awareness Water and Life > Methods

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1002/wat2.1416

Cites

171 of 171 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • The consistent performance of acoustic indices across environments and methods used to extract biological data suggests that indices-based estimates might be generalisable.

    “This consistent performance of acoustic indices across environments and methods used to extract biological data suggests that indices‐based estimates might be generalisable and encourages their use as a complementary approach to traditional survey methods (Greenhalgh et al., 2020; Melo et al., 2021).”

    From Acoustic indices as proxies for biodiversity: a meta‐analysis (2022) · cites this paper as Greenhalgh et al., 2020

    Section 4 (page unavailable) reports that some acoustic indices correlated with manually assessed sound diversity and recommends comparing index values with conventional biodiversity estimates. It also reports that other indices failed to correlate and calls for assessment across a range of habitats. The paper therefore supports a complementary role for acoustic indices, but not the claimed consistent performance across environments and extraction methods or the resulting suggestion of generalisability. (LLM, conf=0.86)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

1 of the 172 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 7

  1. CGL2017-88764-R, MINECO/AEI/FEDER, Spain). The funders did not contribute to the literature review design, anal- ysis, decision to publish or in the preparation of the manuscript.
  2. Water Framework Directive. (2000). Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2000 establishing a framework for community action in the field of water policy. Official Journal of the European Communities, 22(12), 2000.
  3. Finke, C. (1968). Lautäußerungen und Verhalten von Sigara striata und Callicorixa praeusta (Corixidae Leach., Hydrocorisae Latr.). Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Physiologie, 58(4), 398-422.
  4. King, I. M. (1999c). Species-specific sounds in water bugs of the genus Micronecta. Part 2. Chorusing. Bioacoustics, 9(4), 297-323.
  5. Lamml, M., & Kramer, B. (2005). Sound production in the reproductive behaviour of the weakly electric fish Pollimyrus marianne (Mormyridae, Teleostei). Bioacoustics, 15(1), 51-78.
  6. Muralidharan, M., Selvakumar, C., Sundar, S., & Raja, M. (2010). Macroinvertebrates as potential indicators of environmental quality. Inter- national Journal of Biological Technology, 1, 23-28.
  7. Wright, J. F., Furse, M. T., & Moss, D. (1998). River classification using invertebrates: RIVPACS applications. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems, 8(4), 617-631.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Greenhalgh, J. A., Genner, M. J., Jones, G., & Desjonquères, C.
Affiliations
  • University of Bristol (GB)
  • Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (ES)
Corresponding author
Greenhalgh, Jack A.
ORCID
Venue
WIREs Water
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2020-02-12
Volume
7
Issue
3
ISSN
2049-1948 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1002/wat2.1416
OpenAlex
W3005798880
Cited by
33
References
172
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 8 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 5
FWCI
1.99
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Water (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Bristol Research (University of Bristol) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • St Andrews Research Repository (St Andrews Research Repository) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
  • Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (CGL2017‐88764‐R)
  • Natural Environment Research Council (s100096‐105)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Marine animal studies overview
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Developmental Biology › Animal Vocal Communication and Behavior
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Freshwater macroinvertebrate diversity and ecology
Keywords
passive acoustic monitoring, fish sounds, ecoacoustics, freshwater arthropods, lentic habitats, lotic habitats, freshwater biodiversity

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review