Do Fish Remember?

[bloocrab]

WeeWee,

If you've read any of my books, you may have seen this before

"I've had plenty of fish tanks in my day and done lots of studying and tests...yeah, my fisheeez went through ( ) with me..

..dragging tiny lure-like objects through the tank ..watching their behavior...taking a fish out of the tank, then 15 seconds later..putting him back in and watching his actions...and the actions of the others..

...when you put the fish back in, he finds the closest safe structure...and catches his breath. I imagine a Striper to do the same, especially after a hard battle with the rod. They also won't feed right away or chase the lure-like object. The others also appeared to watch him for a bit before pursuing the lure-like object..almost like they were thinking, "what got into him?" ...I think they felt the vibrations he was giving off while breathing heavy and from the initial shock of being out of the water..and felt a bit nervous. The exception to this observation was when I put one back, while they were being fed real food. At that time, they only reacted to the initial release, then continued feeding and payed no attentin to the released fish.

As far as lure retention...they chased the same lure-like object...everyday I tested. What seemed to happen was, after so many attempts to swallow this object with no success and probably no taste (scent), they paid less attention to it, showing the possibility of some short term memory...very short though. 10 minute interval, and they were back at it again. This may not be the case with their salt-water cousins in their natural environment, these were just some tests and observations I recorded while the snow melted outside.

These notes have been taken and edited from the Bloocrab Chronicles, Copywritten and protected by the (FCA) Federal Claws Act."