Why Don’t I
just get a dog?
This is a
question that popped into my mind as I again started to train another bizarre
animal species.
I’ve been
now involved with animal care and training about thirty years. Never in my life
have I owned a dog. This does not mean that I would not have been working with
one but it seems that I’m bound to work with some more exotic animals.
Most of my
experience is related to aquatic environment; like seals, dolphins etc. Lately
I've been more involved with domestic animals; ponies, bunnies and also birds.
I do find
it interesting to get involved with challenging tasks. Once you get to the goal
it is so very rewarding. However sometimes I come to think that why on earth do
I have to collect so challenging training tasks? Why not just work with a dog?
I’m sorry
for the word “just” – it’s not to give any discredit to any dog trainer /
-training. Sometimes it just feels that it would be so much easier.
Banded Archerfish
Anyhow, the
latest training task is; Banded archerfish. On the other hand this is one of
the very first animals I’ve trained in my early days as aquarist.
Banded
archerfish is best
known for its ability to spit a jet of water to "shoot down" prey,
like small insects or flies. Banded archerfish have mouths adapted to spit jets of
water over distance, usually to knock prey into the water. The banded
archerfish shoots the jet of water by raising its tongue against the roof of
its mouth, forming a tube. The opercula then close quickly, pressurizing water
along the tube.
The shooting ability is genetically imprinted in this
fish species but the accuracy of a “shot” is a learned ability. It is even said
that they can hit a moving target. Shooting distance can be up to appr. 150 cm.
This school of fishes I started to work with is situated on a public aquarium here in Finland
(Särkänniemi Oy, Tampere). At the starting moment none of the fish school
individuals were using their special ability to catch prey this way. Often
times animals tend to behave on energy based principle. What this means is that
they act on a way which is most energy effective way to satisfy their primary
needs. Especially this applies for hunting behavior; if there is a way of
getting food with less effort and smaller amount of energy loss, it is of
course a better option for the animal in question for its survival.
In other
words this school of banded archerfishes had been kind of “spoiled”. They have
always been fed to the water. It’s been easy for them just be at spot where the
food is been delivered. There is no need for using the shooting ability as food
is available also without doing so.
The very
first experience that I now have with them is reinforcing this theory. I did a
feeding platform for getting them spit water to get the food. The platform is
made of long ice-cream spoons. Nothing happened during the first trial.
Primary forces
Hunger is a
very strong primary force. It even makes some of us humans steal, in order to
get our needs to be satisfied. With this case I’ll be using it also on a
controlled way. I will not leave those poor fish starving. I believe I can
achieve the ultimate goal of “waking up” their unique ability, just by
transforming the regular daily feeding schedule to later moment during the day.
What the fishes will get is an instant reward of shooting the prey – the lure
I've made them in the spoons. This food is available for them earlier during
the day - they just need to make a small effort of getting it.
By doing
this I’m actually trying to get them frustrated and seek for nourishment from
the environment. This is very natural hunting phenomena and it is indeed enriching
their environment. So by adding this type of behavioral need in their
environment I am getting them mental exercise, especially as this school of
fishes has not been using their shooting ability.
At the
beginning I used a bit of luring by feeding these fishes underneath the spoons
I made for the purpose. I’m also keeping the feeding spot at the beginning in
the very same place so that they will understand the connection between food
and spoons faster. I am also observing all activity of the fish school because
I want to reinforce most of their effort of making the shot by tossing some
food underneath the spoons every time any of the individuals is making an
effort. At the very beginning the spoons are almost touching the water surface,
later once the behavior of shooting the water has been established I will take
the spoons further away from the
surface.
Frustration
Frustration
is a difficult matter to be handled once we are using it on animal training.
You don’t want to get the animals too frustrated as it will most likely lead
into some form of aggression. Even after three days of this exercise with
banded archerfish I can already see some territorial or dominant behavior
between the fishes in the school. However if you are capable of using it a
properly small amount of frustration your creating a phenomenon called
extinction burst.
Extinction
burst is a short timeline in the animal’s behavior when it is trying a bit
harder to accomplish the reinforcement it is used to get by performing a
certain magnitude of behavior. This is something that is very much programmed
into any of us, but it is also a great tool in animal behavior management.
However one should be rather talented when we are using this kind of method in
molding animal behavior.
By
restraining a bit the food intake to these animals I’m convinced that they will
be affected by the previously mentioned phenomenon. This will make them search
for different ways of getting the reinforcement. Actually after three days of
exercise this has been proven to be true – some, not all, individuals of the
school of these fishes have started to spit on my lure (the spoon with food in it). And just by
the day five I could already raise the spoon appr. 10 cm above the water
surface.
I also got
a very good experience on how powerful the spitting of water with these rather
small fishes is; while I was putting some minced shrimp on the spoon I was shot
by one of the fish right at my eye. It was striking how powerful the shot was!
No wonder they can get i.e. flies dropped into water by this way.
The process
of training this natural ability to this school of fishes is still, while I am
writing this article, in the very beginning stage. However the progress after
only a few days is extreme – not necessarily surprising but rather vast. The
task is to get most of the fishes involved in using their ability to use this
preying method. Also one of the clear target is to get the target further away
from the fishes so that they have to make shot longer, as they do have
according to the literature an ability to make the shot up to 1,5 meters.
Update & followup 09/2020
I bumped on this blogtext in my computer and though that this one definitely needs an update & a follow up report.
Just a quick note first:
- I still don't have a dog of my own even though I've been a hole lot more into dog training but also in zoo animal training & welfare.
But - to the point:
So we now living - the bizzare year 2020 - and lost has happened on this training task since this text was written.
At the time of writing the previous text I had just recently started the training protocol - and like any training task it did have it's "up's & down's" but eventually the whole procedure was a success.
Most - almost all - of that school of archer fishes learned this innate behaviour of theirs. This was such a success that we added it into our weekly program for public to see how faraging of this amazing species happens.
An interesting notification was also that as I explained previously; at the beginning I was reinforcing almost every attempt of "shooting" from the fishes in order to get them the most reinforcement of their attempts or a successful behaviors.
However in some point I gradually stopped it to see how the behaviour had proceeded and how reliable it was. At this point and ever after that - it was not always the individual "shooting" that got the food reinforcement or all of it, sometime the one misses it completely.
This actually is brilliant!
- at first this may seem rather unfair: The one which is doing all the "work" is getting less or nothing !!
But this is just how it works in the nature ... AND - it is the very same what we as professional trainers do; we don't reinforce every single attempt or behavior - BUT; we keep them on variable schedule of reinforcement, which is know to motivate animals the most.
So the nature of this type of feeding and foraging behavior in archer fishes is actually sustaining a high level of motivation because of the fact that the primary reinforcement is on a very variable schedule for each individual.
At the moment the animals are in about 30-50 cm distance from the water surface to hit the target, which in our case is adequate and suitable and clearly shows what the prey capabilities are of these archer fishes.
We are also in the second generation of fishes in our setup. Those are not of our own rearing but of individuals imported to the aquarium. What is interesting with them is that in their case I didn't do any training with them (..or very minimum of it). I just wanted to see how well they can mimic the older and more talented fishes. Mimicry takes longer time - as there is often some other individual which is capable of "shooting", so there is not such a great demand of using this talent.
..but - all in all - the younger generation has also learned to use their innate behavior pretty well.
So - mimicry as a learning procedure has now been proven also with fish species.
This has been an interesting journey and experience; All I can say is that take the challenge to find innovative ways of training all types of animals without any prejudices in the tasks ahead.
Enjoy
Sincerely
Kai
Mattsson
animal
behaviorist
