Is it possible that one of my goldfish is this smart?
About a month ago I added some stuff that was supposed to be good for the plants in my tank. I only added a fraction of what was recommend. But from what I gather adding the plant food along with the increasing temperature here resulted in a lot of algae in the tank.
So I bought one of those magnet glass cleaner things and that did a fairly good job. But it was hard to get all it around the filters and near the gravel.
And it was tedious to use the magnet thing every week.
So I bought snails. Two little snails. They are effing awesome. The goats of the sea!
So here is my actual question. One of the snails has been cleaning around the substrate and there is one specific fish that follows the snail around and removes the substrate near the glass clearing a path for the snail. The fish doesn’t mess with the snail. It just pulls some gravel in the snails path into its mouth and then spits it out about a inch away.
I’m having a hard time thinking the fish is is smart enough to assist the snail.
Any other possible theories?
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17 Answers
No. There isn’t conscious ‘helping’ going on.
It’s more likely that there’s some more primitive, food based thing going on.
Here is the thing. It is only one fish out of four that does this. The fish does not do it with the other snail. I have four fish and two snails.
And the fish when I vacuum the gravel and stir up shit instantly eject the poo from their mouth.
The fish is actually pulling rocks into its mouth swimming a inch away and spitting the rock out and then repeating. It is doing it in a methodical way.
My first hunch was chasing snail poo. But I find it odd that the other fish aren’t chasing the poo too.
Your one fish may be preparing to lay eggs. Fish are known to do that to the sea bed.
I don’t know what it’s thinking, but it’s clearly up to something related to that snail. I’m going to say yes, it is a smart goldfish.
I say yes. Not that I’m a fish expert, I just think it’s cute.
I’m going with that one fish is smart. I have a smart one in my pond. The ice has melted and the water temperature is slowly rising. It is still below 50F so i am not feeding them.
However, every day I scoop out one or two large scoops of leaves and sludge from the bottom. When i do this I also stir up some sediment and plant and leaf matter.
All the other fish swim to the other side of the pond when i put the net in. But one fish swims toward it and hangs around. When i pick up the scoop it swims in the leaf matter i stirred up.
I’m guessing it is finding something to eat there.
That or it’s trying to commit suicide. .
Is there any way to isolate the snail from moving around the tank to monitor the behavior of the smart fish minus its teammate? Perhaps you could confine the snail in a clear inverted jar ordrinking glass and then observe smarty’s reaction.
You need to post some video of this. Undersea friends.
I like the 2 suggestions above. ^, ^^. You can do a scientific paper on it! That might be the basis for a research paper or a small NSF Citizen science grant. Interspecies cooperation, Actinopterygii – Gastropoda feeding interaction.
Maybe someone else can come up with a better title
@LuckyGuy “Something fishy going on in the aquarium – A study of….”
Maybe you have a smart fish, or maybe you have a bossy snail.
The more and more research done on animal intelligence the more we find that animals are smarter than we always thought.
I think your fish may have OCD. You might want to contact the Fish Psychology Research Lab. They may be able to help with behavior modification or medication.
I’ve seen that before, as a children’s cartoon on PBS.
“Mathematic precision” I know what your next pet will be, LOL.
I even checked to see if there was a Fibonacci relationship. i didn’t find any.
(I’m such a tool.)
I’ve eaten those fish. I was with a bunch of macho Japanese guys who liked to visit a certain chef. He would slice the fish to within a micrometer of the poison spot. The goal was to eat it until your lips got a little numb. Macho. stupid.
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