Photosynthetic oxygen bubble stream sounds from aquatic macrophytes, and their consequences for acoustic biodiversity inventories and acoustic communication in shallow freshwater settings

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The emerging field of soundscape ecology focuses on biological, geophysical, and anthropogenic sounds, and provides a non-invasive method to inventory ecosystems. Most of the work on freshwater soundscapes focuses on larger fishes in deeper water, or on insects. We suggest the possibility that such studies have either missed or misidentified photosynthetic oxygen bubble sounds (POBS) produced by bubble streams from damaged macrophytes in sunny shallow water. These contribute significantly to local soundscapes. We recorded such sounds in the shallows of Gull Lake, Alberta, Canada, where POBS from sago pondweed (Stuckenia pectinata), along with water boatman stridulations (Hemiptera: Corixidae), comprised almost all of the sounds we encountered. These sounds attenuate rapidly with distance, and the POBS constitute a remarkable acoustic diversity, resulting in a patchwork of very different soundscapes in these shallows. Recognition of POBS has important consequences for acoustic bioinventories in shallow water, rapid ecosystem assessments involving indices of primary production, and bioacoustics studies of such organisms as corixid bugs, communicating against a cacophonous background of POBS.