I recentley observed something very interesting in my clown knife fish's behaviour. I have been observing communication in my south american cichlids based on eye signals- they tend to have eye signals similar to humans to do things such as convey anger/feelings and indicate objects.
So thus, I have been spending a lot of time looking eye to eye with my fish.
But the most interesting thing i have observed so far was with my clown knife fish.
I spent several hours looking him in the eye, as he creeps on me all the time and theres a chair by the tank.
We looked at eachother in the eye for so long i relazed and kind of zoned out... reaching a state not dissimilar to meditation, which is pertanant because this is the mindset I now believe clown knives inhabit..
I as I looked him in the eye I noticed that he was making very subtle movments with his face, directed toward me. The fish appeared to be trying to communicate me based on a complicated ritual that centered around the pupil. He would look me in the eye and slightly rotate his head vertically (rotating on the x axis like your eye would in the socket in a circle.) If i followed him he would lead me up then slightly rotate his head back and do the creepiest thing... "smile".
the rotation seemed to be intended to draw my eye up into his space then he replaced it with one of the bends in his mouth. I drew a diagram because there are two places that they can "smile".
The places marked "1" and "2" are both bends in the mouth structure, given how their enormous mouth folds into their head. So they create two places that can move independantly of eachother as subtle facial movement. Its like sort of a slow twitch, and is incredibly subtle, but it really is a slight "smiling" motion. After drawing my eye to it by tilting, he would 'smile' at me with either part of his mouth, but never both. THis seemed to be the primary means of communication as far as I could tell. One could assume that given the equal nature of these two that they could constitute a binary.
Quite creepy but really quite something.
The mark "3" on the picture indicates the circles and rods drawn out from the eye. The movment is centered around the eye but takes place in a fashion indicated by the circles. They will generally tilt the body slightly with the head pointing down or up to accomplish this motion. there is no yaw involved, or if it is, it appears to be meaningless.
What was most astonishing about this interaction is the depth of feeling I percieved from it. It was something very etheral that I could not explain, and it left me feeling wierd and alien. Fish mostly seem to communicate with synchronization between organisms, and synchronizing in this way with such a different creature was really quite an experience.
I encourange others to try this and post their experiences here. I would be interested to know if anyone else has observed this behaviour before in knife fish, either with people or with eachother.
I only have one knife fish and have never kept a group; it would be interesting to know if there are accounts of knives doing this sort of rotating behaviour with eachother, eye to eye, as that would be an indication that they do use it as a means of interpersonal communication. (or is it intericthyological? lol is that a word)
I encourage all thoughts and experiences. but remember, if you are going to try this, it was very subtle movement, only visible to me after staring at him for a long time. So I don't want to get a lot of posts that just say they dont do it. I was in a half-meditative state, being lulled into it watching the way he moves, which i find mesmorizing.
I intend to do a video study of this behaviour to better illustrate it, then to see if I can observe the behaviour in other ck fish. If i get a good response to this post I'll keep updating it with this info, so subscribe if you find this interesting.
So thus, I have been spending a lot of time looking eye to eye with my fish.
But the most interesting thing i have observed so far was with my clown knife fish.
I spent several hours looking him in the eye, as he creeps on me all the time and theres a chair by the tank.
We looked at eachother in the eye for so long i relazed and kind of zoned out... reaching a state not dissimilar to meditation, which is pertanant because this is the mindset I now believe clown knives inhabit..
I as I looked him in the eye I noticed that he was making very subtle movments with his face, directed toward me. The fish appeared to be trying to communicate me based on a complicated ritual that centered around the pupil. He would look me in the eye and slightly rotate his head vertically (rotating on the x axis like your eye would in the socket in a circle.) If i followed him he would lead me up then slightly rotate his head back and do the creepiest thing... "smile".
the rotation seemed to be intended to draw my eye up into his space then he replaced it with one of the bends in his mouth. I drew a diagram because there are two places that they can "smile".
The places marked "1" and "2" are both bends in the mouth structure, given how their enormous mouth folds into their head. So they create two places that can move independantly of eachother as subtle facial movement. Its like sort of a slow twitch, and is incredibly subtle, but it really is a slight "smiling" motion. After drawing my eye to it by tilting, he would 'smile' at me with either part of his mouth, but never both. THis seemed to be the primary means of communication as far as I could tell. One could assume that given the equal nature of these two that they could constitute a binary.
Quite creepy but really quite something.
The mark "3" on the picture indicates the circles and rods drawn out from the eye. The movment is centered around the eye but takes place in a fashion indicated by the circles. They will generally tilt the body slightly with the head pointing down or up to accomplish this motion. there is no yaw involved, or if it is, it appears to be meaningless.
What was most astonishing about this interaction is the depth of feeling I percieved from it. It was something very etheral that I could not explain, and it left me feeling wierd and alien. Fish mostly seem to communicate with synchronization between organisms, and synchronizing in this way with such a different creature was really quite an experience.
I encourange others to try this and post their experiences here. I would be interested to know if anyone else has observed this behaviour before in knife fish, either with people or with eachother.
I only have one knife fish and have never kept a group; it would be interesting to know if there are accounts of knives doing this sort of rotating behaviour with eachother, eye to eye, as that would be an indication that they do use it as a means of interpersonal communication. (or is it intericthyological? lol is that a word)
I encourage all thoughts and experiences. but remember, if you are going to try this, it was very subtle movement, only visible to me after staring at him for a long time. So I don't want to get a lot of posts that just say they dont do it. I was in a half-meditative state, being lulled into it watching the way he moves, which i find mesmorizing.
I intend to do a video study of this behaviour to better illustrate it, then to see if I can observe the behaviour in other ck fish. If i get a good response to this post I'll keep updating it with this info, so subscribe if you find this interesting.
