Abstract
Fishes obtain substantial information about their environment by listening to the sounds around them. Indeed, because sound propagates rapidly and over great distances in water as compared to in air, it provides f ishes with information from far greater distances than do other sensory stimuli. Thus, any interference with detection of sounds has the potential of reducing fitness and impacting the lives of fishes (e.g., Popper and Hawkins, 2019). Although the sounds that fishes hear are confined to low frequencies (often to no more than 800–1000Hz, but this is very species dependent) in comparison with many terrestrial vertebrates and aquatic mammals, fishes are able to discriminate between sounds of different amplitude and frequency, and between calls that differ in their temporal characteristics (e.g., Fay, 1988; Fay and Megela Simmons, 1999). Fishes are also able to use auditory cues to seek out the location of a sound source (Sand and Bleckmann, 2008; Hawkins and Popper, 2018). Sounds may play a role in navigation, foraging for prey, detection of predators, and communication of reproductive state, and some marine species may use sound for habitat selection. Detailed discussions of the role of sound in the lives of fishes can be found in several recent reviews (e.g., Popper and Hawkins, 2019; Putland et al., 2019).