Comparative analysis of fish sounds recorded during an early acoustic experiment in a Mediterranean seagrass meadow
Abstract
Posidonia oceanica seagrass meadows constitute an important ecosystem of the Mediterranean Sea, providing habitat for many species of invertebrates and fishes, some of which produce sounds with distinctive features. Using such sounds to monitor marine habitats is at the core of passive acoustic monitoring. In the Mediterranean, an arched frequency modulation centred around 747 Hz, which aurally sounds like /kwa/ , has been investigated as an environmental proxy. Remarkably, these sounds were already noted as a distinctive feature of the soundscape recorded during an early acoustic experiment, USTICA 99 (Ustica, Sicily, Italy), which simultaneously measured photosynthetic gas exchanges and fish migration at the scale of a Posidonia meadow. In this study, we revisit that dataset to describe the specific characteristics of the early recorded /kwa/ sounds and compare them with more recent field studies conducted in French P. oceanica meadows, approximately 500 km north of Ustica and 15 years later. Our comparative analysis confirms a high degree of homogeneity in the /kwa/ sounds, with some variations that are further examined.
Related
- Phenology of fish movements between a mediterranean lagoon and the sea: Insights from acoustic camera and fishers’ local ecological knowledge
- Biology and Comparative Mitogenomics of Psyttalia carinata, Newly Recorded From China as a Parasitoid of Rhagoletis batava
- Uncoupling of seagrass host selection and succession for microbial guilds in meadow chronosequence
- Functional division between root endosphere and rhizosphere microbiomes supports seagrass holobiont resilience under high nutrient and sulfide exposure
- SEARAM – Seagrass Bed Rapid Assessment Method: A Spatially Explicit Approach to Assessing Seagrass Ecological Condition with Multiple Applications
BibTeX
@article{raick2026comparative,
title = {{Comparative analysis of fish sounds recorded during an early acoustic experiment in a Mediterranean seagrass meadow}},
author = {Xavier Raick and Jean-Pierre Hermand and Cédric Gervaise and Lucia Di Iorio},
journal = {Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom},
year = {2026},
month = aug,
doi = {10.1017/s0025315426101465},
url = {https://hal.science/hal-05795993v1},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Comparative analysis of fish sounds recorded during an early acoustic experiment in a Mediterranean seagrass meadow
AU - Xavier Raick
AU - Jean-Pierre Hermand
AU - Cédric Gervaise
AU - Lucia Di Iorio
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/08/05
JO - Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom
DO - 10.1017/s0025315426101465
UR - https://hal.science/hal-05795993v1
AB - Posidonia oceanica seagrass meadows constitute an important ecosystem of the Mediterranean Sea, providing habitat for many species of invertebrates and fishes, some of which produce sounds with distinctive features. Using such sounds to monitor marine habitats is at the core of passive acoustic monitoring. In the Mediterranean, an arched frequency modulation centred around 747 Hz, which aurally sounds like /kwa/ , has been investigated as an environmental proxy. Remarkably, these sounds were already noted as a distinctive feature of the soundscape recorded during an early acoustic experiment, USTICA 99 (Ustica, Sicily, Italy), which simultaneously measured photosynthetic gas exchanges and fish migration at the scale of a Posidonia meadow. In this study, we revisit that dataset to describe the specific characteristics of the early recorded /kwa/ sounds and compare them with more recent field studies conducted in French P. oceanica meadows, approximately 500 km north of Ustica and 15 years later. Our comparative analysis confirms a high degree of homogeneity in the /kwa/ sounds, with some variations that are further examined.
SN - 0025-3154
SN - 1469-7769
ER -