Turns out, there are fish that garden and weed. The dusky damselfish, or stegastes nigricans, is a tropical reed fish that tends to its own patch of algae, cultivating the kind it likes and uprooting the strains it doesn’t. It also chases away anything else that tries to swim or crawl onto it’s lawn, as would any reasonable gardener. Neat:
Lead author Hiroki Hata told Discovery News that he and his colleagues saw damselfishes defending territories where certain algae grew. Each damselfish would do this by chasing off sea urchins and other fish. “Additionally, an intensive farmer, Stegastes nigricans does weeding on less digestible algae, and it results in a monoculture of a specific algal species,” said Hata… He and colleagues Katsutoshi Watanabe and Makoto Kato watched with amazement as the damselfish picked up this unwanted algae and dumped it outside of their farm-like gardens. The scientists did an experiment to see how the fish-preferred algae would grow without the arduous maintenance. They found that the “weeds” would quickly overcome the other algae.
Video:
And now – in arguably the most hackneyed plug evuh – realize that while the damselfish gardens and weeds, you don’t have to. Head over to Southern California-based Purchase Green – this month’s Sunday Cute sponsor – and take a look at some of the low-maintenance artificial turf that they sell.
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Photo:
* Elapied [Wiki Commons]
References:
* Fish Garden, Even Do Weeding [DiscoveryNews]
Related Mere Rhetoric Categories:
* Lighter Side
* Brain-Melting Animal Cuteness
* Animals Are Taking Over
