Assessing the tolerance of fish and fish populations to environmental stress: The problems and methods of monitoring

Environmental stress is an inescapable aspect of life in the aquatic environment. The chemical and physical demands of life underwater impose somewhat rigorous constraints on aquatic species (Smith, 1982a). Superimposed on such demands may be the additional. physiological constraints of particular ecological niches. It is true that aquatic species are adapted to these conditions, but this does not imply the absence of energy drains (Lugo, 1978). For example, thermophilic fishes must still cope physiologically with the demands of high temperatures even though they are adapted to high temperatures per se.