The Evidence Is In: Fish Are Intelligent!
Click through to see the images.
In a Nature paper, published in 2007, the lab of Dr. Russell Fernald at Stanford University showed that fish are capable of inferring which fish to fight for territories based on observations of previous interactions with other territorial fish [1]. After observing a series of interactions between several males, they are able to use deductive reasoning to infer an implied dominance rank among the observed individuals. Later on, in 2010 the Fernald lab showed that females are able to remember which males had won or lost in a fight, and when given a choice, preferred winners over losers [2].
Work performed by Dr. Trevor Hamilton and Erica Ingraham at MacEwan University has shown that fish can remember where they are receiving food 12 days after the training period had ceased (unpublished data). It makes sense that fish would be capable of remembering where to find food or mates, how to avoid predators, or where to best lay eggs, as these decisions significantly impact fitness and reproductive success.
Figure 1 (right): Image of a recorded path from video tracking software used at in Dr. Hamilton’s Lab at MacEwan University. Tracking plot shows fish spend more …read more
Read more here: Advanced Aquarist
Comments are closed.
