STUDY: FISH KNOW YOU BY WHAT YOU WEAR

According to a new study published in the journal Biology Letters, fish can tell people apart based on their outfits. Researchers say sea bream in the Mediterranean Sea could tell divers apart from subtle differences in their diving gear and followed the one that would reward them with food. But when divers wore identical dive gear, correct identification of divers was greatly diminished, suggesting that discrimination was based predominantly on visual cues. Researcher Katinka Soller from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior initially fed the fish while wearing a bright red outfit. But the fish still followed her instead of fellow researcher Maelan Tomasek when she switched to plainer dive gear, with Tomasek also wearing slightly different gear.
* Interesting. So fish follow the one with the food, no matter how they’re dressed. Do I have that right?
* Maybe the fish didn’t want to follow Maelan ’cause he’s kind of a jerk. That’s the word around the institute, anyway.
* They not only study what you wear, they trash talk it to their mean fish friends back in the school. Of fish. The school of fish.
* Are there a lot of situations where I would want fish to think I’m somebody else? ‘Cause I’ve been in the ocean a lot and so far it hasn’t come up.
* In any case, Katinka Soller from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior said the broiled bream dinner that night was delicious.