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For the last six weeks, I have been
participating in an exciting class at the New England Aquarium. The class,
Marine Biologist In Training (MBIT), takes place every Saturday for six hours.
Yesterday was my last class, and although I was sad the class was over, I
learned so much in such a short time! There were about 20 kids, and three great
and informative instructors.
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The first big question was: what is a fish?
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"A fish is a limbless, cold-blooded,
vertebrate animal with gills and fins that lives wholly in water."
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Of course, there are always exceptions. For example,
the mud skipper can hop in and out of the water if they are being chased.
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There are 32,000 species of fish (that we know
of)! 47% of fish live in freshwater and 52% live in salt water. For those of
you who did the math and figured out that 47% and 52% only add up 99%, the
other 1% of fish are anadromous, meaning that born in freshwater, spend
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most of their life in the salty sea, and come
back to freshwater ponds to spawn like herring or salmon. Here are a few of the
best fun facts I learned:
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Did you know that tuna are cold-blooded and live
in cold environments, but can move their eyes and watch out for predators and
prey because their eyes are warm-blooded?
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There are three different kinds of camouflage:
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Cryptic camouflage, where the fish blend in with
their surroundings, either dynamically or they are just naturally that color.
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Disruptive camouflage, where the fish is
striped. This can be confusing to any predatory fish, because most have
terrible eyesight.
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Counter shading, where a fish is blue on the top
and white on the bottom. The blue top looks like the ocean from any birds
above, and the white underneath would look like sky to any fish hunting from
below.
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During the first class, we talked about what
defines a fish, and the importance of fish.
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In the next class, we talked about fish anatomy
and conducted dissections of dogfish, sting rays, and a flounder! We were able
to open up the stomach of one of the dogfish and we found a few small squid in
her stomach.
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The week after, we talked about fish habitats
and took a behind-the-scenes tour of the aquarium! We saw where the sick fish
are kept (the ill ones as well as the really cool 'sick' fish) and where the
extra, too young, or stressed fish live. We also started talking about herring
and the Weymouth Herring Run. We talked about how different stakeholders effect
and are effected by herring, and how the Herring population are being depleted
and why, as well as what the stakeholders can prevent it.
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The next week, I unfortunately had to miss, but
the class went on a field trip to the Weymouth Herring run. Cool, right?
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The second to last class was more of the same,
exploring the aquarium and talking about the Herring in preparation for our
debate the next week. The coolest thing we learned was how some of the fish in
the Giant Ocean Tank are fed, and what they eat. Then, we got to feed them -
how awesome is that!
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Finally, we reached the day of our debate. We
each argued for what we thought the best solution to the depletion of herring
would be, where the money would come from, and how we would go about solving
it. In the end, we decided that priority one was to educate the public of
Weymouth on the issue and that priority two would be to take out all the
invasive species in the ponds where herring come to spawn.
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We ended the class with an aquarium-wide
scavenger hunt (which my team won)! We had to scour the aquarium for names of
venomous fish (like a lion fish), depressiforms (like sting rays or flounder),
compressiform fish (like an angelfish), fish with superior mouths (like a
banded archer fish, hatchetfish), interior mouths (like a catfish) and fish
with barbels (beard-like things, goatfish or catfish have them).
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For the last hour, we had a little party with
pictures, music, and certificates. I am now a fish expert - feel free to
comment any fish questions you may have! To check out the NEAQ website and any
other exciting programs they have going on, click here. All in all, it was a
inspiring and interesting experience and time well spent!
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