I was going through my email at work this morning and came across this little blurb in the Fishlink Sublegals:
With the opening of the San Francisco Bay fishery, the first to open each season on North America's Pacific coast for herring, Canadians are postulating herring noise is due to
flatulence. The New Scientist reports researchers
at the University of British Columbia now believe a mysterious, underwater sound is herring farting. No fish had previously been known to emit sound in such a way, however the UBC team say the noise matches bubbles coming out of a
herring's anus. "It sounds just like a high-pitched raspberry," says researcher Ben Wilson. "Wilson and his colleagues cannot be sure why herring make this sound, but initial research suggests that it might be a means of
communication. Wilson points that, unlike a human fart, the sounds are probably not caused by
digestive gases because the number of sounds does not change when the fish are fed. The researchers also tested whether the fish were farting from fear, perhaps to sound an alarm. But when they exposed fish to a shark scent, there was
again no change in the number of farts. Finally, three observations persuaded the researchers that the farts were most likely produced for communication. Firstly, the number of farts per fish increased when more fish were added to
the tank. Secondly, herrings are only noisy after dark, suggesting they might be a way of finding each other in the dark. And finally, most other fish cannot hear the noises." For more go to:
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm....naturalworld.
Herring Flatulence
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