A sudden change of heart: Warm acclimation can produce a rapid adjustment of maximum heart rate and cardiac thermal sensitivity in rainbow trout

Warm acclimation in fish is often characterized by an increase in heat tolerance and a reduction in physiological rates to improve the scope to respond to additional challenges including further warming. The speed of these responses can determine their effectiveness. However, acclimation rates vary across levels of biological organization and are poorly understood in part because most research is conducted after an acclimation period of >3 weeks, when acclimation is presumed to be complete. Here we show that when rainbow trout were transferred from 10 to 18 °C, over 50% of the total reduction of maximum heart rate (ƒ(Hmax)) (i.e. the thermal compensation at moderate temperatures) occurred within 72 h, with further compensation occurring more gradually over the following 25 days. Also, the ability to increase ƒ(Hmax) with acute warming improved within 24 h resulting in a 30% rise in peak ƒ(Hmax), but this ultimately declined again with prolonged (28 days) exposure to 18 °C. In contrast with some previous studies, upper critical temperatures for ƒ(Hmax) did not increase. Nonetheless, we demonstrate that rapid cardiac plasticity is possible in rainbow trout and likely blunts the impacts of thermal variation over relatively short timescales, such as that associated with heat waves and migration between water bodies.