Cautions about precautions

Assuming an animal to be sentient in the absence of conclusive evidence to the contrary is an extreme position, hence it should not and could not be the default assumption. Birch explains how the precautionary principle may be used to substantiate decisions to give the animal the benefit of doubt. Although I am reluctant to accept all of his points, Birch has provided an excellent argument for the use of the precautionary principle for the detection of animal sentience. I agree that more research is needed to refine and understand this relationship

Records of the Greenside Darter, Etheostoma Blennioides from the Susquehanna River Drainage in Pennsylvania

Author Institution: Department of Biological Sciences, York College of Pennsylvania; Department of Biology and Center for Environmental Studies, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and Appalachian Environmental Laboratory, University of Maryland, Frostburg State College CampusA population of the greenside darter, Etheostoma blennioides Rafinesque, is recorded for the first time from the Susquehanna River drainage. Meristics are significantly different from populations in the adjacent Allegheny and upper Genesee drainages for dorsal rays and least caudal peduncle scales. Taxonomic comparison places it in the subspecies E. b. blennioides. The population is believed to have entered the Susquehanna drainage via stream capture from the Allegheny. Its presence until now has been undetected because emphasis on taxonomic-distributional research has centered in other geographic areas

Iodotropheus sprengerae Oliver & Loiselle, 1972 (Osteichthyes, Perciformes): proposed replacement of holotype by a neotype

Volume: 52Start Page: 321End Page: 32

Description of Metriaclima koningsi, a new species (Teleostei: Cichlidae) from Lake Malaŵi, Malaŵi, Africa

Stauffer, Jay R. (2018): Description of Metriaclima koningsi, a new species (Teleostei: Cichlidae) from Lake Malaŵi, Malaŵi, Africa. Zootaxa 4370 (1): 95-100, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4370.1.

Similar anatomy does not imply comparable function

Woodruff concludes that ray-finned fishes (Actinopterygii) are sentient and that the pallium contributes to sentience in these fishes. He gives a detailed description of the pallium; however, he assumes that similar structures in fishes and tetrapods support similar behaviors, capabilities, and functions. I reject the premise that similarities in structure imply similarities in function. The fact that a selected species of fish may exhibit behaviors, reactions, and/or anatomy suggestive of sentience does not necessarily generalize to all teleosts

The potential for sentience in fishes

Balcombe’s book is filled with information on the biology, behavior, and life history of fishes. I do not agree with all his premises. I am still somewhat perplexed about the discussion of whether fish feel pain; I am not sure whether the distinction between nociception and pain makes any difference. Overall, however, his treatment of the principles of both natural and sexual selection is comprehensive and accurate, and has greatly increased my knowledge and awareness of the biology, ethology, and potential for sentience in fishes. In summary, this work has exposed me to new ideas about how to examine fishes and it has forced me to think about and explore many of the concepts presented

Bower Size and Male Reproductive Success in a Cichlid Fish Lek

Sexual selection may be a major factor in the proliferation of polygamous species (Lande 1981). When males provide no resources or parental care and females have numerous males from which to choose, extravagant male secondary characteristics may result solely from sexual selection (Darwin 1871; Fisher 1930; Lande 1981). Dominey (1984) argued that such runaway sexual selection was the driving mechanism behind the explosive speciation of the polygamous cichlid fishes in the Great Lakes of Africa. However, the few studies examining cichlid mate selection in situ have concentrated primarily on species engaging in biparental care of the young (Perrone 1978; Neil 1984; McKaye 1986). Although reproductive behavior has long been hypothesized to be important in the ecology and evolution of cichlids (Lowe-McConnell 1959; Fryer and Iles 1972; McKaye 1984), factors influencing female choice and the relative reproductive success of males are poorly known for most field populations. Several hundred cichlid species inhabit the sandy and weedy environments of Lake Malawi (McKaye 1984; McKaye and Gray 1984; McKaye, in press) and have lek-based breeding systems (Fryer and Iles 1972; McKaye 1983, 1984) with display sites that vary dramatically among species. Leks are defined as aggregates of adult males that do not contribute resources or parental care; females visit only to have their eggs fertilized (see Bradbury and Gibson 1983; Borgia 1985). During ecological studies of this sand-dwelling community, we have discovered 10 basic, sand forms built by cichlid fishes in the Cape Maclear region of Lake Malawi (McKaye 1984, in press). They range in size from giant craters 3 m in diameter (McKaye and Stauffer 1988) to small depressions in the sand and include sand castles (Bass 1988, see pp. 152-153 for photograph) with base diameters of more than 1 m (McKaye 1984). Because display sites vary significantly in size and shape, an experienced observer can distinguish among sibling species on the basis of the display site alone (McKaye 1984; McKaye and Stauffer, MS). Relationships among species presumed from the similarity of display sites have recently been confirmed by electrophoretic analyses of tissue samples (McKaye, J. Howard, Stauffer, R. Morgan, and F. Feresu, MS). The term nest has been used to describe these display sites (Fryer and Iles 1972; Keenleyside 1979; McKaye 1983, 1984; McKaye and Stauffer 1988). However, we now prefer to use the term bower as found in the ornithological literature (Collias and Collias 1983; Borgia 1985; Borgia et al. 1985) to characterize these sites of courtship and spawning. They are constructed independently of the need to care for eggs and young (McKaye 1984). The female deposits eggs in the bower (nest) and then immediately picks them up in her mouth, where they are fertilized. Eggs are then brooded solely in the mouth of the female. Males engage in no parental care. The form and function of the arenas and the display sites, or bowers, are clearly analogous to bird leks (Fryer and Iles 1972; McKaye 1983, 1984). Some arenas are relatively small (30 m x 20 m); others may extend for several kilometers. Bower size could be a critical characteristic in determining female choice and relative male success for the species Cyrtocara eucinostomus (McKaye 1983). Therefore, we examined the dynamics of female mate choice in this species, one of the zooplankton-feeding fishes, or utaka, from Lake Malawi, which Dominey (1984, p. 236) specifically discussed in support of the sexual-selection hypothesis of speciation. We tested two hypotheses: (1) male reproductive success improves as bower size increases; and (2) after a disturbance, density, dispersion, and sizes of bowers in this arena rapidly return to predisturbance conditions. We directly observed the behavior of C. eucinostornus males above bowers and experimentally removed bowers in order to answer five subsidiary questions. Did males above large bowers attract more females? Were larger bowers defended more aggressively, or more persistently, than smaller bowers? Were new bowers rebuilt in the same place as old bowers or were they established de novo? Were any bower characteristics species-specific? And finally, were patterns of bower initiation and construction consistent spatially within the arena? Answers to these questions would provide a basis for further examining the role sexual selection may have played in the explosive cichlid radiations common to the Great Lakes of Africa (Dominey 1984)