Potential for Anthropogenic Fin Damage to Affect Individual Responses to Prey in Bluegill Sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus): A New Hypothesis for Kinematic Studies

In fishes, damage to important morphological structures such as fins through natural damage and anthropogenic factors can have cascading effects on prey capture performance and individual fitness. Bluegill sunfish (Lepomis macrochirus) are a common freshwater species in North America, are a model organism for performance studies, and often experience natural injuries. We opportunistically sampled two populations of fish in the lab to generate a hypothesis for the effect of sub-lethal fin damage resulting from the capture technique on kinematic performance during prey capture in bluegill. We found no statistical differences in mean prey capture kinematics or predator accuracy, but damaged fish used more variable kinematics and more readily struck at non-prey items. We suggest that a reduction in stability and individual consistency occurs as a result of fin damage. This difference could have consequences for higher-order ecological interactions such as competitive ability, despite a lack of apparent performance cost at the individual level, and deserves consideration in future studies of prey capture performance in fish.