One of the presenters unsuccessfully joked about Michael Phelps, comparing his memory with the memory of fish, denoting it by a gap of three seconds. Are the fish’s mental abilities really so insignificant, or, on the contrary, did the journalist undeservedly offend both the great athlete and the water inhabitants?
What is the memory of fish
The misconception about three-second memory is already refuted by ordinary aquarium pet lovers. Each of them determines the memory time of fish differently. Someone allocates a short memory period of 2 minutes, someone gives other numbers, but everyone agrees that you can develop the habit of swimming up to the place of food by knock or other conditional signal. Many fish can distinguish the owner of the aquarium from an outsider.
When studying the life of carps, it was found that they can form stable groups, disintegrating and gathering again.
At the same time, the age of the community members does not matter. Members of the “family” move not randomly, but following certain routes. They have their own permanent places of feeding, overnight, shelter. This alone proves that the fish do not have such a short memory.
At the same time, each group has its own “veteran” who can somehow pass on his experience to younger friends.
What exactly makes sense to remember
The memory of fish is significantly different from human. It has selective properties; only that which is vital is remembered. River fish remember places of feeding, a resting place, members of the flock, natural enemies. There are two types of fish memory - long-term and short.
Aquarium fish also remember the information they need. Unlike their free brothers, they are also able to keep in mind the identity of the owner, the time of feeding. Many experienced fish lovers notice that if they feed their pets by the hour, then during the approximate period of feeding, all the little ones gather in one area in anticipation of food.
They are also able to remember all the inhabitants of the aquarium. This allows them to discover newcomers who are hooked into the aquarium. Some fish study new residents with interest, some shy away from strangers.
To reliably answer the question "do fish have a memory?", Various experiments were carried out.
Australian experience
Particularly noteworthy is an experiment conducted by an Australian student. He placed the beacon in the place where he threw food to his pets. Moreover, he placed it in different places, so that the fish could remember the label and did it 13 seconds before the distribution of food. This went on for three weeks. The first days the fishes needed at least a minute to gather at the distribution site. By the end of the experiment, they had already completed this task in about five seconds.
Then the researcher took a break of six days and distributed food without a beacon. After the resumption of the experiment, he was surprised to find that after the descent of the lighthouse, the fish took only 4 seconds to swim to the place.
This showed that both long-term and short memory are well developed in fish. That is, they remembered the event that happened a week ago, and they had the patience to wait a half dozen seconds before the distribution of food after the descent of the beacon.
Cichlid experiment
Scientists from Canada conducted a slightly different experiment to determine the memory of fish. They tried to figure out whether cichlids were able to remember exactly a particular feeding place, not associated with an identification mark.
For three days they poured food into the aquarium in one specific place. By the end of the experiment, most fish swam there. Then all cichlids were transplanted into another aquarium, which was completely different both in structure and volume from the first. There they spent 12 days. Then they were returned to their native aquarium. Scientists found that all the fish swam in the exact area where they were given food twelve days ago.
Many other experiments have been conducted. Of particular interest is the experience of Japanese researchers, where fish with transparent bodies were studied, and scientists using the entered labels could visually study the work of the brain of living beings.
In any case, numerous experiments and practical observation experiments showed that the memory of fish is not fiction, and it significantly exceeds three seconds. Not everyone is able to store information as long as these creatures. So it is not known who was the most offended by the above TV presenter - Michael Phelps or the fish.