Fish Invasions in the World's River Systems: When Natural Processes Are Blurred by Human Activities

By Fabien Leprieur, O. Beauchard, S. Blanchet, T. Oberdorff, S. Brosse. PLoS Biology, 2008

611 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Because species invasions are a principal driver of the human-induced biodiversity crisis, the identification of the major determinants of global invasions is a prerequisite for adopting sound conservation policies. Three major hypotheses, which are not necessarily mutually exclusive, have been proposed to explain the establishment of non-native species: the “human activity” hypothesis, which argues that human activities facilitate the establishment of non-native species by disturbing natural landscapes and by increasing propagule pressure; the “biotic resistance” hypothesis, predicting that species-rich communities will readily impede the establishment of non-native species; and the “biotic acceptance” hypothesis, predicting that environmentally suitable habitats for native species are also suitable for non-native species. We tested these hypotheses and report here a global map of fish invasions (i.e., the number of non-native fish species established per river basin) using an original worldwide dataset of freshwater fish occurrences, environmental variables, and human activity indicators for 1,055 river basins covering more than 80% of Earth's surface. First, we identified six major invasion hotspots where non-native species represent more than a quarter of the total number of species. According to the World Conservation Union, these areas are also characterised by the highest proportion of threatened fish species. Second, we show that the human activity indicators account for most of the global variation in non-native species richness, which is highly consistent with the “human activity” hypothesis. In contrast, our results do not provide support for either the “biotic acceptance” or the “biotic resistance” hypothesis. We show that the biogeography of fish invasions matches the geography of human impact at the global scale, which means that natural processes are blurred by human activities in driving fish invasions in the world's river systems. In view of our findings, we fear massive invasions in developing countries with a growing economy as already experienced in developed countries. Anticipating such potential biodiversity threats should therefore be a priority.

Subfields: Ecology, Nature and Landscape Conservation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/59d186ccbc8a95ad314e89be24cf796158c91e79

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Ecology

In Nature and Landscape Conservation

Citations in the corpus

A review of current knowledge, risk and ecological impacts associated with non-native freshwater fish introductions in South Africa. (2014, background): “…mechanisms include: specifically chosen species with proven establishment rates and prior invasion success elsewhere (Marchetti et al. 2004b; Ribeiro et al. 2007; Ruesink 2005); high propagule pressure (Copp et al. 2007; Leprieur et al. 2008) and physiological tolerances (Marchetti et al. 2004b).”
Establishment success of invasive ring‐necked and monk parakeets in Europe (2009, background): “The human-activity hypothesis is invoked to explain the often-found correlation between the presence of exotic species and human activities (Guo et al., 2006; Leprieur et al., 2008).”
A global assessment of freshwater fish introductions in mediterranean-climate regions (2013, background): “The introduction of non-native fishes has resulted in the loss of faunal uniqueness of these regions while increasing the total number of fish species (see also Leprieur et al., 2008; Marr et al., 2010).”
Alien species in fresh waters: ecological effects, interactions with other stressors, and prospects for the future (2010, background): “Inventories of specific, well-studied parts of the biota, usually fishes (e.g., Whittier & Kincaid, 1999; Leprieur et al., 2008), are more common than comprehensive inventories, and confirm that aliens often constitute a large fraction of the species, individuals, or biomass of freshwater ecosystems”
Consequences of the introduction of exotic and translocated species and future extirpations on the functional diversity of freshwater fish assemblages (2013, background): “The introduction of non-native freshwater fishes is a significant component of global environmental change (Leprieur et al., 2008a,b; Marr et al., 2010).”
Impacts of non-native fishes on Iberian freshwater ichthyofauna: current knowledge and gaps (2010, background): “Actually, their results revealed that western and southern Europe – including the Iberian Peninsula – is one of the six global invasion hotspots where non-native fish species represent more than a quarter of the total number of species per river basin (Leprieur et al. 2008).”
Disentangling the role of environmental and human pressures on biological invasions across Europe (2010, neutral): “40) probably reflects that introductions have been a massive phenomenon across Europe for stock enhancement and sport fishing (23, 41).”
Fish and mussels: Importance of fish for freshwater mussel conservation (2018, background): “Fish are among the most widely introduced aquatic organisms (Leprieur et al., 2008) and among the ones most severely affected by non- native species (Hermoso et al., 2011).”
Predicting establishment success for introduced freshwater fishes: a role for climate matching (2010, background): “…establishing in climatically suitable areas, although the role of biotic resistance is controversial and the presence of previously introduced species may even facilitate establishment success (Moyle and Light 1996a; Ricciardi 2001; Kennedy et al. 2002; Fridley et al. 2007; Leprieur et al. 2008).”
GAPeDNA: Assessing and mapping global species gaps in genetic databases for eDNA metabarcoding (2021, background): “…since referencing species occurrence outside their native range necessarily assumes their observation and a large proportion of introductions being intentional for recreational fishing (Leprieur, Beauchard, Blanchet, Oberdorff, & Brosse, 2008), making tissue for genetic sequencing easily available.”
Contrasting patterns and mechanisms of spatial turnover for native and exotic freshwater fish in Europe (2009, background): “Such a result is not surprising, as human-assisted freshwater fish introductions breach natural geographical barriers to movement in Europe (Garcı́a-Berthou et al., 2005), leading to greater fish fauna homogenization in southern Europe (Clavero & Garcı́aBerthou, 2006; Leprieur et al., 2008a).”
Functional homogenization exceeds taxonomic homogenization among European fish assemblages (2014, background): “3), which is consistent with previous studies on freshwater fish faunas in Europe (Clavero & García-Berthou, 2006; Leprieur et al., 2008b; Villéger et al., 2011a; Hermoso et al., 2012).”
Behavioural responses to human‐induced environmental change (2011, background): “These species fare well in disturbed environments, where populations of native species are declining, and frequently have a large impact on biodiversity by causing further declines in the abundance of native species (Leprieur et al., 2008).”