Mythbusters goldfish maze?

[Tifftastic]

A friend of mine and I are in this biology lab this quarter and our project for the quarter is to design an experiment.
My friend wants to do something tying to the goldfish maze that mythbusters created. If you never seen it, basically they were trying to bust the myth that goldfish have a 3 second memory. They created a maze out of clear plastic and placed it inside an aquarium, they dropped in goldfish and tried to make them swim the maze for food. Very similar to a rat maze. So my friend wants to do this for our group experiment. Only, we need to use more types of fish than goldfish. We have been thinking some danios maybe . . . and at others we are stumped.

So my questions are:
1) has anyone ever heard of any studies similar to this?
2) anyone have any ideas or suggestions on types of fish, how difficult to make the maze or anything else?

Thanks

 

[Sploke]

Never seen it done other than on mythbusters. Making the maze should be pretty easy, you can just do what they did - get a 20long or a 30 gal or whatever and insert a few baffles with silicone with various holes in them to get to one end or the other.

Any smallish, easy to care for fish should work. What is going to happen to the fish when the experiment is over? It would be interesting to test a smaller schooling fish like danios or rasboras to predatorial fish like angels or rams. An oscar would be an interesting choice as well, but if you are going to have to care for these fish after the experiment is done, that might not be the best choice if you're not equipped to home such a fish.

 

[lucy42083]

Any smallish, easy to care for fish should work. What is going to happen to the fish when the experiment is over? It would be interesting to test a smaller schooling fish like danios or rasboras to predatorial fish like angels or rams. An oscar would be an interesting choice as well, but if you are going to have to care for these fish after the experiment is done, that might not be the best choice if you're not equipped to home such a fish.

:iagree:I also had the same thought when I saw this Mythbusters episode, about comparing different types of fish to see the differences in how quickly they could 'solve' the maze. That would be a pretty cool experiment, as long as you had plans to care for the fish after it was done.

 

[Reefscape]

the way i see it.....hmmmm....the way i see what, Niko? Oh yes....the way i see the maze experiment......maze experiment?? yes, Niko, the maze.....Who is Niko? hmmmm...anyway, where was i? Ahhhh...the maze experiment should be a good one....a good one? Yes Niko, the maze experiment? remember?.......Oh, i forgot....why was i in a maze experiment?.......nevermind.....

 

[Tifftastic]

Oh ya we have it all figured out on how to take care of them afterword.
Our main concerns are how the stress of moving them will affect their performance. We are making sure the new tank will be cycled and such.

 

[The Zigman]

We're going to do what we do every day, Pinky....

I bet if you made the maze out of some dark acrylic, it would be alot easier..
But it fish only have a 3 second memory, then wouldnt they....

Humm thats weird, I forgot..


Oh yeah if they only had a 3 second memory then why would they always hide in the same place every day.. And how would they know we were going to feed them?

 

[HrdWodFlor]

I cant be much help in saying what types of fish to use, but check out this link: http://www.r2fishschool.com/
Maybe you can do something similar. It would make for a great class presentation.

 

[1oooop]

I'd have to say, I REALLY wanna do this, I wonder of shrimp will do the same thing... I bet snails can... LOL... mythbusters had ammonia spike.... oh, I think it's the arcrylic... idiots... get a professional fish keeper

 

[Tifftastic]

After much deliberation we have decided against a maze and decided to do plastic boxes in the corners. Only one of these boxes will be fed each day, our goal is to see whether or not the fish will choose the correct box each day.

I'm thinking that it is gonna work good. Due to size restrictions our four fish species are goldfish, danios, female bettas and threespine stickleback. The stickleback are readily available through the science department so it seems like a good idea.

Anyone else have any input? I am really excited about this experiment.

Oh and we are cycling filters in advance so that we dont have that ammonia spike.

 

[fishdude92]

use corydoras, they have good sense of smell