Not to beat a dead horse, but I don't think a clown takes food, a tankmate, or whatever back to its host to feed the host. I think its taking a comparatively huge chunk of food back "home" to eat in safety, and its unique home can eat that food. A lot of us have witnessed clowns feeding their anemone in our tanks, but no one sees it in nature. How would a clown KNOW that "my home=death to other things" when it poses no danger to themselves?
I don't think we ever observe clown fish in their natural enviroment. We just cannot stay down in there long enough and their behavior change when this large chunk of meet is right there in front of them. If I were to study clown fish behaviors, I would put a camera on the anemone and clown fish and tape them or view these remotely. Then we can truely observe the interactio of the two in the wild. I don't think that have been done. It would be interesting. I am sure that clown fish in the wild 'feed' their anemone with hapless small fish also, just like in aquarium. This happen a lot more than many reefer realize. It happen all the time in aquarium. We log quite a lot more time observe anemone and clownfish interaction in aquarium. I am sure we know, and learn a lot more when we keep the pair in aquarium because we can just have longer to observe them.wombat":18w285u3 said:
IMO, these behavior are hardwire into the fish "bring extra food home. bring other competitor home" The one that do this will help the anemone become bigger and stronger. Bigger and stronger protector=better survival for both. This behavior thus will be seclected by natural selection.
Minh
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I do not believe that clowns eat other clowns, competitors or not. So the female clown was not bringing the Maroon back to her host so she could eat it later.
Since we can clearly eliminate the "stash the food and eat it later" theory, we can only surmise that the Ocellaris brought the young Maroon to the anenome to have it killed. The fact that the Anenome ate it just happened to be a bonus for the anenome. So we can also say that the female clown clearly KNOWS that "my home = death to other things".
Ruthlessness aside, I would say that this kind of premeditation indicates an intelect on the part of the Ocellaris that is suprising.
I do not believe that clowns eat other clowns, competitors or not. So the female clown was not bringing the Maroon back to her host so she could eat it later.
Since we can clearly eliminate the "stash the food and eat it later" theory, we can only surmise that the Ocellaris brought the young Maroon to the anenome to have it killed. The fact that the Anenome ate it just happened to be a bonus for the anenome. So we can also say that the female clown clearly KNOWS that "my home = death to other things".
Ruthlessness aside, I would say that this kind of premeditation indicates an intelect on the part of the Ocellaris that is suprising.
Here's a quote from "Anemonefishes and their Host Sea Anemones" by Fautin and Allen:
BTW, I found your original post to be an interesting (if sad) story, and I didn't really mean to hijack your thread.
I don't see any reason why a clown wouldn't eat another clown. I've seen them eat small guppies and goldfish by chewing them apart, so they're physically capable of doing it.
BTW, I found your original post to be an interesting (if sad) story, and I didn't really mean to hijack your thread.
What about the possiblilty that the female just act like this because she just does. Just like my sons will turn his face up when I poor water on his head in a bath. He just does it even this is where the water come from. He does not know that air is lighter than water and up is where the air are. It is just his instinc that cause him to turn his face up when he is under water.Mac_1962":yzv1q38j said:
IMO, the female Ocellaris just drag another clown of a different species into her anemone. It is just her instinct that cause her to act like this. She doesn't think of anything, doesn't know about anything. She just do this because for thousand of generations, clown fish that acts this way are more likely to have more offsprings that will live and reproduce.
Minh Nguyen
Minh,
You have to draw the line somewhere between instinct and thought. A roach runs if you turn on the light. Not a very big brain, maybe it's instinct.
Take a dog and feed him the same time everyday (Pavlav sp??) and he starts to drool. The previous generation dog wasn't fed at the same time so it can't be instint.
A monkey picks up a stick and uses it to knock apples from a tree. This is a little more than cause and efect. The "monkey" in this case is a fish and the "stick" is an anomene but the results are the same. The fish used a tool to get rid of a problem.
I would challenge that even cause and effect requires some kind of thought. If I kick you everyday, by the 3rd or 4th day, if you see me coming you will run or cower (even if you only have a liitle fish brain). Me = kicking = sore butt = you don't like it. If it hurt and you didn't like it you would only move after teh first kick. You wouldn't remeber the next day to move before I kicked.
You have to draw the line somewhere between instinct and thought. A roach runs if you turn on the light. Not a very big brain, maybe it's instinct.
Take a dog and feed him the same time everyday (Pavlav sp??) and he starts to drool. The previous generation dog wasn't fed at the same time so it can't be instint.
A monkey picks up a stick and uses it to knock apples from a tree. This is a little more than cause and efect. The "monkey" in this case is a fish and the "stick" is an anomene but the results are the same. The fish used a tool to get rid of a problem.
I would challenge that even cause and effect requires some kind of thought. If I kick you everyday, by the 3rd or 4th day, if you see me coming you will run or cower (even if you only have a liitle fish brain). Me = kicking = sore butt = you don't like it. If it hurt and you didn't like it you would only move after teh first kick. You wouldn't remeber the next day to move before I kicked.
OK, here's an interesting thought then: How would this situation have played out if the clowns had been hosting in a Goniopora or Euphyllia coral, which definitely wouldn't have killed the maroon clown? Do you think the ocellaris clown would have done the same exact thing? I believe she would have. Animals can show an amazing array of behaviors that might seem like rational thought, but like Minh said, it is just programmed behavior which confers a better fitness upon that animal.
What Pavlov showed was that an unrelated stimulus (a bell) could cause a response in dogs when they were presented with food and the bell at the same time. Very neat, but it doesn't require any conscious thought on the dog's part. You can cause humans, flatworms, and fruit flies to do the same thing. If you want you can hook up a heart monitor to a person and, say, have a bell ring whenever their heart rate goes up. Then tell that person to try and make that bell ring as much as possible. Even if they don't know what causes the bell to ring, they can unconsciously cause their heart rate to go up (or down, or whatever...). This is a brief description, but this has been done with controls, etc. Now, if you were an outside observer who didn't know what was going on you might think: " Wow, what an intelligent being that can control its own heart rate!" But that's not what is really happening. An artificial situation is being constructed, similar to our fish tank, and it appears that rational thought is being employed.
A clownfish in nature that either a) fed its anemone or b) brought competitors to its anemone to be killed would, IMO, be at a huge disadvantage. Think of all the extra metabolic energy spent, and chance of predation that the clownfish would risk, with very little, if any, gain for its own survival. It is much more selfish (i.e. higher fitness) for the clown to only feed itself and to simply chase off competitors.
I would need to have a few beers with all of you before I could discuss what the clown was thinking, or if it can think (bordering on philosophy, sheesh)... It's my opinion that the ocellaris clown intended on eating that maroon clown... but I'm sure not many will agree with me.
What Pavlov showed was that an unrelated stimulus (a bell) could cause a response in dogs when they were presented with food and the bell at the same time. Very neat, but it doesn't require any conscious thought on the dog's part. You can cause humans, flatworms, and fruit flies to do the same thing. If you want you can hook up a heart monitor to a person and, say, have a bell ring whenever their heart rate goes up. Then tell that person to try and make that bell ring as much as possible. Even if they don't know what causes the bell to ring, they can unconsciously cause their heart rate to go up (or down, or whatever...). This is a brief description, but this has been done with controls, etc. Now, if you were an outside observer who didn't know what was going on you might think: " Wow, what an intelligent being that can control its own heart rate!" But that's not what is really happening. An artificial situation is being constructed, similar to our fish tank, and it appears that rational thought is being employed.
A clownfish in nature that either a) fed its anemone or b) brought competitors to its anemone to be killed would, IMO, be at a huge disadvantage. Think of all the extra metabolic energy spent, and chance of predation that the clownfish would risk, with very little, if any, gain for its own survival. It is much more selfish (i.e. higher fitness) for the clown to only feed itself and to simply chase off competitors.
I would need to have a few beers with all of you before I could discuss what the clown was thinking, or if it can think (bordering on philosophy, sheesh)... It's my opinion that the ocellaris clown intended on eating that maroon clown... but I'm sure not many will agree with me.
I don't think there is any animal that use tool without the teaching of human. A chimpanzee is very close to human in evolutionary term. The DNA of the Chimp is 98% identical to human. Small clown fish is another mater. There is just no way, IMO, that a clown fish able to use tool as you put it.brewerbob":26wmsdcg said:
Minh Nguyen
IMO, it would be opposite. It hardly tank any effor at all for a large mature clown to drag a small clown to it's host. Think how much protein it is for the anemone. If you consider the whole 'unit' clown fish and anemone as one organism, having that junk of food would be a plus given how much effort the 'organism' spend to aquired the food. If the anemone died, the clown fish will be eatten by larger fishes quickly while if the clown fish are removed the anemone would be kill by predation (burterfly fishes) quickly. Given this reason, it is not unreasonable to consider both as one organism. If it is good for one, it is as good for the other.wombat":3gzu1wzv said:
For sure, I disagree. IMO, clown fish are programed to bring larger pieces of food, too large for them to eat, to the anemone. No one observed it in the wild because this is a relatively rare occurence and we cannot stay under forever to observe the fish.
Minh Nguyen
Minh, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree here , until someone sees it happening in nature... I think that catching and subduing another fish would have a large metabolic cost to a clown, which isn't a very fast or strong swimmer as fish go. It at least takes more energy than simply chasing a fish away, (until in the confines of an aquarium). In most of the symbiotic relatioships I've heard of, one animal won't go out of its way to benefit the other organism. Ever seen a shrimp goby feed its shrimp?
, until someone sees it happening in nature... I think that catching and subduing another fish would have a large metabolic cost to a clown, which isn't a very fast or strong swimmer as fish go. It at least takes more energy than simply chasing a fish away, (until in the confines of an aquarium). In most of the symbiotic relatioships I've heard of, one animal won't go out of its way to benefit the other organism. Ever seen a shrimp goby feed its shrimp?Minh Nguyen":z9rdm1r1 said:
I love these kind of debates!! Ok, so what is man? Nothing more (or less) than a hairless ape. Why do you think man is so special? Don't get me wrong, I'm going to run that cat over before I swerve and wreck my car but I don't think humans are the only animals that think.
Animals that hunt in packs have to have some form of communication. How can you communicate if you can't plan and think? I'm not referrig to schooling fish here, I'm thinking lionnesses and wolves. One stalks from behind while two more wait to do the flanking.
As for the Clown, let's assume it is tank raised which it may very well be. How many generations have been raised since the first clown was dropped in a tank? If the instinct was "bred" into the fist by survival of the fitest, how long would it take to breed back out? My point (and questions) are directed at the fact that the clown doesn't have to compete. Every morning a great big hand drops food in, there are no preditors cruising around waiting to eat the clown or the anemone. It is a sterile little world the fish lives in. Look at Pengiuns; they have no fear of anything (except killer whale). How many wild animals will allow a man to aproach? They should be scared if for no other erason than you are bigger and block out the sun with your shadow.
If it's all just instinct, wouldn't they instinctively know that when they bring food back to their anenome that they're never going to see it again? I'm sure that over the last few thousand years, that in all the times clowns have brought food back to save it for later they have collectively never seen it again.
Me too.brewerbob":3lnlkir0 said:
Man is just the smartest predator on Earth. Man turn the whole earth his/her domain. I guess man is not really smart be cause I see bad things happen to earth in the not too far future from man's doing.
All of these animals are mammals, and all are predators.
Unless the trait is specifically breed out, it tank a long, long time indeed. Did you know that most of the Leghorm hen (the one that give us almost all the white eggs in the market) still incubates their eggs? I raised them about 20 years ago. I got 20 hens and more than half of them still incubating their own eggs if given a chance. There must be at least 40-50 generations (large number anyway) of these hens hatch with incubators prior to being reared by myself. I am sure if we select and only use hen that do not incubate their eggs to breed, we can breed this programmed trait out of the chicken quickly. If we don't, this trait may never be breed out of the chicken.
Tank raise clown still go for anemone. They have no need for the anemone; they did not learn that anemones are safe, yet most will go for anemone that natural host their species in the wild. My tank raise clowns go into my H. maginfica within 15 minutes I put the anemone into the tank while they did not go into my BTA even if they share the tank with the BTA for more than 1 year. This is not a learned behavior. It is instinct. There can be no other explanation. They don't know that these anemones are dangerous for other fish but not for them. It is just their instinct. The clown does what instinct tells them to do. No thinking involved.
What is your point here? Penguins are not afraid of man because they never see man before. Why is a large segment of human afraid of snake? It is in the instinct of many mammals to be fearful of snake because they are dangerous.
Almost all human children afraid of height. This is a survival trait. The risk of injury or death form fall is much much higher if a child play high off the ground when he/she not able to use their motor function fully.
There are many actions in man and in other animal that have the roots from instinct. IMO, the behavior of the clown feeding the anemone with larger food that they can eat, and the action of dragging smaller competitors to the anemone is nothing other than instinct.
Minh Nguyen
All you have to do is looking at the dams build by two species to answer that question. Comunicating and hunting instint is one thing, tinking and problem solving is another. You asked what is so speciall about man, the answer is that they are smart animals. Most animals that are smart are mamals. There are exception. Maybe Octopus have high inteligent level. I cann't think of an other animal that can 'solve problem' and not a mamals.brewerbob":1dshyu2i said:
The act of killing an other animal that are almost at large as themself to eat it require the ability to react to the actions of the preys. This is why predators are brainier than prey. If they are not smart they will not able to capture their prey and will starve.
That is why I point out the examples of 'smart animals' you mentioned are mamals and predetors. Clown fishes are neither.
Hey this is cheating. You can't argue like this. Give specific example Then they will not contribute to the geene pool will they. I am not saying that there are no animal that are unfit for survival, but a chicken that will not incubate her eggs is as unfit as you can get. In the wild, this chicke will have zero offspring.
We know that BTA is not danderous to Ocellaris clown because many Ocellaris live in BTA in aquarium. How can you argue that my Ocellaris learn to live in my H. magnifica? He have nover seen a anemone prior to go into my tank. He have never seen a clown fish in the anemone before. He just dive into the anemone (H. magnifica but not the BTA) within 15 minutes of placing them together.
I never said that fish can not learn. Tang will eat Nori clip. If you have a tank that does this in the tank, the rest of the tangs will copy him within a few hours. If you don't have one, it may take you a week to teach your tang to eat from the Nori clip. I am sure that my clown reconize that the H. magnifica is the right anemone while the jBTA is the wrong anemone because instict taught them to prefer one over the other. It cannot be anything but instint.
This is a clownfish we talking about. Man is different because we are alot smarter. Thour my reason, I cannot make any conclution other than the fact that my Ocellaris action is purely instinct.
You are wrong here. I am not saying that all the thing a child should fear is instinct. I only said that the fear of height is the one instinct that a normal child have. I have two sons and spend lots of time watching them. Do you have any children?
I am not sure if penguins fear man or not. How ever, if they do not, the lack of fear can be explain by the fact that penguins have not being exposed to man though out evolution. As a species, they do not have Human as a prgramed predator of penguins.
However, if you get a lab raised rat that hve never seen a snake before and put it into a snake cage, I am sure that it would be react in terror even before the snake start to stalk it. Rat have in their instinct to be affraid of snake, their mortal enemy thoughout evolution.
Bob,
It is nice to argue with you.
Cheers and Peace,
Minh Nguyen
I think this backs up my point
They've only been bringing food back to their anemone for the last 30 or so years that they've been in our aquariums, because they don't do it in nature! This is not enough time to evolve behavior. If you didn't read my quote from the Anemonefish book, read it now. I'm sure these folks know a lot more than all of us about the behavior of these fish. Minh, you never answered my question about the shrimp goby...
Do you believe, then, that an anemone would die if not fed regularly by a clown? This could actually be tested on wild anemones by removing clowns and preventing predation by butterflyfish.This is a bit silly. Maybe if you introduced a very small yellow tang to your tank it would.
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