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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Fish Sci.
Sec. Fish Experimental Biology
Volume 3 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/frish.2025.1581493
This article is part of the Research TopicFish welfare and cognitionView all articles
Effect of different levels of environmental enrichment on the welfare of guppy (Poecilia reticulata)
Provisionally accepted
Isabella Manenti*
Benedetto Sicuro
Elisabetta Macchi
Patrizia Ponzio
Riccardo CrosettoSharon Cavallari
Martina Tarantola
Cecilia Mugnai- University of Turin, Turin, Italy
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The breeding of ornamental fishes is increasingly widespread across the world. For this reason, it is becoming ever more important to assess the welfare of ornamental fish in aquariums. This study wants to evaluate, through minimally invasive analyses, as behavioral observations and analysis of cortisol concentrations in the water, how the absence or presence of Environmental Enrichments (EE) influences the welfare of guppies (Poecilia reticulata). A total of 15 tanks, divided by environmental enrichment level (without, with low (25%) and with high (75%) levels of EE), were considered. Fish were video recorded and behavioral analyses were carried out. In addition, the concentrations of cortisol in the water of each tank were evaluated. In the tanks with higher environmental enrichment, behaviors such as "wood, flotation and plant feeding" and "courting", which are indicators of a good quality of life, were significantly more expressed. Behavior "bite" was also more expressed in high levels tanks, probably as a response to the territoriality of animals. The only stereotype behavior, a stress index, was found significantly more expressed in tanks with low levels of EE. Lastly, cortisol concentrations were found significantly higher in tanks with low levels of EE. In the light of these results, we conclude that fish in tanks with higher EE levels showed a better welfare status. It is therefore useful to consider the use of EE in tanks, to enable these fish to express their species-specific behavioral repertoire and improve their quality of life.
Keywords: Guppy, welfare, environmental enrichment, Behavior, cortisol
Received: 22 Feb 2025; Accepted: 25 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Manenti, Sicuro, Macchi, Ponzio, Crosetto, Cavallari, Tarantola and Mugnai. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Isabella Manenti, University of Turin, Turin, Italy
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