Can scale cortisol concentration be quantified non-lethally in wild fish species?

Cortisol, the primary glucocorticoid in fishes, is secreted into the bloodstream in response to stress. Circulating cortisol accumulates in scales, a durable calcified structure that can be easily sampled from many fish species. As such, the use of scale cortisol concentration (SCC) is currently being explored as a means of chronic stress biomonitoring in wild fishes. Scales serve an important role in fish physiology and thus the number of scales required for reliable cortisol analysis is a limiting factor in the non-lethal collection of such samples. To date, scale cortisol quantification has also only been performed non-lethally in captive fishes and due to differences in stress responsiveness SCCs likely differ in wild species. As such, this study aimed to (1) apply our fish scale processing and analysis protocol to wild fish species and (2) apply it to five north temperate fish species to provide information useful to future non-lethal scale sampling regimes. Cortisol was successfully measured in scales collected from wild northern pike (Esox lucius), walleye (Sander vitreus), whitefish (Coregonus clupeaformis), white sucker (Catostomus commersonii) and captive rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss). SCCs were significantly different between species and thus the sample mass required for reliable cortisol analysis differed as well. In addition to the size of the fish and the mass of their scales this is an important consideration for future scale cortisol analyses as these factors could make SCC an attainable non-lethal sample matrix in some species of fish but impractical in others.

Automated summary

Cortisol, the primary glucocorticoid in fishes, is secreted into the scales in response to stress. This study successfully applied the scale analysis protocol to wild fish species and found significant differences in cortisol concentrations between different species. The sample mass needed for reliable cortisol analysis also varied, which is an important consideration for future non-lethal sampling regimes.