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Animal behaviour is remarkably sensitive to disruption by chemical pollution, with widespread implications for ecological and evolutionary processes in contaminated wildlife populations. However, conventional approaches applied to study the impacts of chemical pollutants on wildlife behaviour seldom address the complexity of natural environments in which contamination occurs. The aim of this review is to guide the rapidly developing field of behavioural ecotoxicology towards increased environmental realism, ecological complexity, and mechanistic understanding. We identify research areas in ecology that to date have been largely overlooked within behavioural ecotoxicology but which promise to yield valuable insights, including within- and among-individual variation, social networks and collective behaviour, and multi-stressor interactions. Further, we feature methodological and technological innovations that enable the collection of data on pollutant-induced behavioural changes at an unprecedented resolution and scale in the laboratory and the field. In an era of rapid environmental change, there is an urgent need to advance our understanding of the real-world impacts of chemical pollution on wildlife behaviour. This review therefore provides a roadmap of the major outstanding questions in behavioural ecotoxicology and highlights the need for increased cross-talk with other disciplines in order to find the answers.

Chemical contaminants (e.g. metals, pesticides, pharmaceuticals) are changing ecosystems via effects on wildlife. Indeed, recent work explicitly performed under environmentally realistic conditions reveals that chemical contaminants can have both direct and indirect effects at multiple levels of organization by influencing animal behaviour. Altered behaviour reflects multiple physiological changes and links individual- to population-level processes, thereby representing a sensitive tool for holistically assessing impacts of environmentally relevant contaminant concentrations. Here, we show that even if direct effects of contaminants on behavioural responses are reasonably well documented, there are significant knowledge gaps in understanding both the plasticity (i.e. individual variation) and evolution of contaminant-induced behavioural changes. We explore implications of multi-level processes by developing a conceptual framework that integrates direct and indirect effects on behaviour under environmentally realistic contexts. Our framework illustrates how sublethal behavioural effects of contaminants can be both negative and positive, varying dynamically within the same individuals and populations. This is because linkages within communities will act indirectly to alter and even magnify contaminant-induced effects. Given the increasing pressure on wildlife and ecosystems from chemical pollution, we argue there is a need to incorporate existing knowledge in ecology and evolution to improve ecological hazard and risk assessments.

In recent years, the sediment compartment has gained more attention when performing toxicity tests, with a growing emphasis on gaining more ecological relevance in testing. Though many standard guidelines recommend using artificially formulated sediment, most sediment studies are using natural sediment collected in the field. Although the use of natural field‐collected sediment contributes to more environmentally realistic exposure scenarios and higher well‐being for sediment‐dwelling organisms, it lowers comparability and reproducibility among studies as a result of, for example, differences in the base sediment depending on sampling site, background contamination, particle size distribution, or organic matter content. The aim of this methodology contribution is to present and discuss best practices related to collecting, handling, describing, and applying natural field‐collected sediment in ecotoxicological testing. We propose six recommendations: (1) natural sediment should be collected at a well‐studied site, historically and by laboratory analysis; (2) larger quantities of sediment should be collected and stored prior to initiation of an experiment to ensure a uniform sediment base; (3) any sediment used in ecotoxicological testing should be characterized, at the very least, for its water content, organic matter content, pH, and particle size distribution; (4) select spiking method, equilibration time, and experimental setup based on the properties of the contaminant and the research question; (5) include control‐, treated similarly to the spiked sediment, and solvent control sediment when appropriate; and (6) quantify experimental exposure concentrations in the overlying water, porewater (if applicable), and bulk sediment at least at the beginning and the end of each experiment. Environ Toxicol Chem 2024;43:1757–1766. © 2023 The Authors. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of SETAC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alternative reproductive tactics (ARTs) can generate considerable within-species life history variation but are often overlooked. Here, we use the invasive round goby (Neogobius melanostomus) to address a number of ecological and evolutionary questions about ARTs. Making use of a 12-year, multisite Laurentian Great Lakes data set, we show that the guarder male tactic was twice as common as the sneaker male tactic but that nonreproductive males were the most common morph. The ratio of guarder to sneaker males did not vary spatially despite a wide range of resource densities across sites. Guarders and sneakers spanned similar age ranges, suggesting that the ARTs are nonsequentially expressed. Based on short-term (gut contents) diet analyses, both reproductive tactics consumed fewer types of food and tended to consume fewer items overall when compared with nonreproductive males. Long-term (isotope) diet analyses showed that guarder males fed at a higher trophic level (higher [[delta].sup.15]N) and had a broader isotopic niche. Our results show that ARTs are an important aspect of this invasive species' breeding system and should be accounted for when assessing and managing populations. Si differentes tactiques de reproduction peuvent se traduire par des variations considerables du cycle biologique au sein d'une meme espece, dans bien des cas, elles ne sont pas prises en consideration. Nous utilisons le gobie a taches noires (Neogobius melanostomus), une espece envahissante, pour examiner differentes questions relatives a l'ecologie et Revolution touchant aux differentes tactiques de reproduction. A la lumiere d'un ensemble de donnees de 12 ans couvrant de multiples sites dans la region des Grands Lacs laurentiens, nous demontrons que les males gardiens etaient deux fois plus repandus que les males furtifs, mais que les males non reproducteurs representaient la tactique la plus repandue. Le rapport des males gardiens et furtifs ne variait pas dans l'espace, malgre une grande fourchette de densite des ressources entre les sites. Les fourchettes d'age des males gardiens et furtifs etaient semblables, donnant a penser que les differentes tactiques de reproduction ne s'expriment pas sequentiellement. A la lumiere d'analyses des regimes alimentaires a court terme (contenus stomacaux), les individus adoptant les deux tactiques de reproduction consommaient moins de types d'aliments et avaient tendance a consommer moins d'articles en general que les males non reproducteurs. Des analyses des regimes alimentaires sur le long terme (isotopiques) montrent que les males gardiens s'alimentaient a un niveau trophique plus eleve ([[delta].sup.15]N plus grands) et occupaient une niche isotopique plus large. Nos resultats montrent que l'adoption de differentes tactiques de reproduction est un aspect important du systeme de reproduction de cette espece envahissante qui devrait etre integre a l'evaluation et la gestion des populations. [Traduit par la Redaction], Introduction The round goby (Neogobius melanostomus) is a highly successful invasive species that has established new populations in both Europe and North America (Corkum et al. 2004; Kornis et al. [...]

Pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) occur as variable mixtures in surface waters receiving discharges of human and animal wastes. A key question identified a decade ago is how to assess the effects of long‐term exposures of these PPCP mixtures on nontarget organisms. We review the recent progress made on assessing the aquatic ecotoxicity of PPCP mixtures—with a focus on active pharmaceutical ingredients—and the challenges and research needs that remain. New knowledge has arisen from the use of whole‐mixture testing combined with component‐based approaches, and these studies show that mixtures often result in responses that meet the concentration addition model. However, such studies have mainly been done on individual species over shorter time periods, and longer‐term, multispecies assessments remain limited. The recent use of targeted and nontargeted gene analyses has improved our understanding of the diverse pathways that are impacted, and there are promising new "read‐across" methods that use mammalian data to predict toxicity in wildlife. Risk assessments remain challenging given the paucity of ecotoxicological and exposure data on PPCP mixtures. As such, the assessment of PPCP mixtures in aquatic environments should remain a priority given the potential for additive—as well as nontarget—effects in nontarget organisms. In addition, we need to improve our understanding of which species, life stages, and relevant endpoints are most sensitive to which types of PPCP mixtures and to expand our knowledge of environmental PPCP levels in regions of the globe that have been poorly studied to date. We recommend an increased use of new approach methodologies, in particular "omics," to advance our understanding of the molecular mechanics of mixture effects. Finally, we call for systematic research on the role of PPCP mixtures in the development of antimicrobial resistance. Environ Toxicol Chem 2024;43:549–558. © 2023 SETAC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Round goby Neogobius melanostomus sagittal (saccular) otolith morphology was compared between males of the two alternative reproductive tactics (termed guarder and sneaker males) and between males captured from sites of high or low contamination. Otolith size increased with fish size and also displayed an ontogenetic shift in shape, becoming relatively taller as otoliths grew in size. Despite a considerable overlap in age between males adopting the two reproductive tactics, size‐at‐age measurements revealed that guarder males are significantly larger than sneakers at any given age and that they invest more into somatic growth than sneaker males. Controlling for body size, sneaker males possessed heavier sagittal otoliths than guarder males. Subtle otolith shape differences were also found between the two male tactics and between sites of high and low contaminant exposure. Sneaker males had relatively shorter otoliths with more pronounced notching than guarder males. Fish captured at sites of high contamination had otoliths showing slower growth rates in relation to body size and their shapes had more pronounced caudal points and ventral protrusions when compared with fish captured at sites of low contamination. The results are discussed in relation to life‐history tradeoffs between the male tactics in terms of reproductive and somatic investment as well as the putative metabolic costs of exposure to contaminants. Overall, this study reveals that male alternative reproductive tactics and environmental contaminants can have small, yet measurable, effects on otolith morphology and these factors should be accounted for in future research when possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]