Brown trout (Salmo trutta) passage performance: a quantitative assessment of two vertical slot fishway designs

17 de outubro de 2025

The alteration of natural river flows caused by damming poses a global challenge for fish communities, disrupting life cycles, genetic diversity, and population dynamics. Vertical Slot Fishways (VSFs) are key tools to restore longitudinal connectivity by allowing fish passage across varying flow conditions. However, their success relies on optimising hydrodynamic conditions for fish attraction, passage and minimal energy use. Despite their importance, standardized passage performance assessments remain limited, hindering fishway improvement. This study compared brown trout (Salmo trutta) passage performance across two VSF designs: the Revolvo (VS), a commonly used configuration, and the El Arral (DN), featuring a deep notch. Fish trials analysed ascent success, motivation, and transit time under a time-to-event approach. Attempt rates were high (91.4% for VS and 85.7% for DN), with passage success at 87.5% (VS) and 86.7% (DN). Larger trout initiated attempts sooner and had lower transit times, confirming size as a strong performance predictor. Median transit times were relatively low (15.5 min/m for VS and 11.5 min/m for DN), indicating minimal migratory delays. This study identifies suitable hydrodynamic conditions for brown trout and provides insights that may contribute to improving fishway functionality, enhancing understanding of the relationship between fishway design and performance in fish passage engineering.

Autores da comunidade :

• 

  F

  Filipe Alexandre da Silva Romão

  ist400095

  Afiliações e fontes

  IST > DECivil > CERIS

  Instituto de Investigação e Inovação em Engenharia Civil para a Sustentabilidade

  De: orcid

  ID: 194534065

  De: scopus

  ID: 2-s2.0-105019368344

  De: cienciavitae

  ID: 4683324

• 

  A

  Ana Isabel da Rocha e Sá Lopes Quaresma

  ist171202

  Afiliações e fontes

  IST > DECivil > CERIS

  Instituto de Investigação e Inovação em Engenharia Civil para a Sustentabilidade

VoR - Versão publicada

Taylor & Francis

https://doi.org/10.1080/24705357.2025.2572572

Journal of Ecohydraulics

10.1080/24705357.2025.2572572

biological-sciences - Ciências Biológicas

Palavras-chave

• Fish passage
• monitoring
• salmonids
• motivation
• stepped fishway
• deep notch

eng - Inglês

https://doi.org/10.1080/24705357.2025.2572572

CC-BY - Atribuição