Synchronized goldfish

[snopes]

Comment: Someone said that they have glued magnets to the bottom of the goldfish, and there is a guy under the table "dragging those poor helpless goldfish around" with another magnet. Wondered if you know, or could find out?

http://video.google.com/googleplayer...91202446&hl=en

[Malruhn]

I dunno, but I think I smell computer graphics here...

[Fun with a 9mm]

Mechanical fish? Or some Reeeeeeeeeeeeeally bored person actually trained them.

[Gibbie]

I say trained. Mythbusters trained goldfish once. It can be done. I forget why they were trying it. Maybe something like this.

Gibbie

Wow. My turtles will follow my hands around a tank when they think I'm going to feed them, but they don't stay in neat formations like the goldfish in the video. Although, my turtles can jump up and take food from my hand (nyah). It is pretty impressive if it's real.

[Mickey Blue]

I'd vote against magnets.. I mean if they were being drug around against their will I'd think they'd be fighting it more then just going with the flow (pardon the pun).

[Morrigan]

I'm another for them being trained.

Morrigan

[Barns & No Bull]

We talked about this on the other snopes board. My feeling is that this is a product of video manipulation. I think they filmed one or two fish and reproduced the moving images to look like a group of fish. Somebody might pick through each video "frame" and look for exact duplicates that are repeated.

Magnets ain't likely because we should see the fish struggle and flail against the strange pull. "WTF is going on here? It's like my own body won't listen to my own fins anymore."

Trained? Please... I guess I was born as a skeptic.

Not to mention goldfish are not the brightest creature on the planet. Nobody is that bored! My 4 goldfish took the better part of a month to figure out that food came from the top of the tank.

Originally Posted by Bramble Silvertree

Not to mention goldfish are not the brightest creature on the planet. Nobody is that bored! My 4 goldfish took the better part of a month to figure out that food came from the top of the tank.

Whether it's true or not, apparently people are bored enough to try: http://www.fish-school.com/

I don't understand why everyone is saying this is fake. Many species of fish school together-- that's the "formation" everyone is raving about. I have no idea if goldfish school, but who says these are goldfish, vs. another species of fish that happen to be gold?

As for training, it isn't too hard to get fish to follow your hand. I used to have an Angelfish that would come to the top of the tank every time I walked by -- that was due to the association of me with food, but you could do similar things with hand motions with some effort.

-Tim

Definitely trained. My father trained goldfish, though not that extensively, in a short time. Food rewards do wonders. And, my dad being retired, means he had a LOT of free time on his hands...

[One-Fang]

Well, until I see the same trick performed on a patterned rug instead of a plain white cloth, I'll reserve judgment. Possibly trained. More easily faked. Why train for that when you can fake it?

[Lady Neeva]

On the one hand, it *could* be real -- goldfish are trainable (as far as fish go, they're actually pretty bright. This is of course the equivilent of being the most delicious booger flavored jellybean in the pack...

On the other hand, they appear to be fantail goldfish, and that variety doesn't tend to be able to move very fast. And when they are swimming as fast as they can, there is a lot more "wiggle" going on -- they have big egg shaped bodies, short stubby tails, and an extra tailfin weighing them down. I can't tell, but if they're veiltails they also have upwards of twice as much finnage and that would slow them down even more.

So, in short... I agree with One-Fang. It's probably possible to train them, but why bother when it would be so easy to fake the same video.

[Bach_girl]

How would one glue a magnet to a wet fish?

[kitoboo]

With my limited knowledge of faking video it would probably be easier for me to train the goldfish than to fake a video. It would probably be a lot more fun too.

-kitoboo

[LittleDuck]

Originally Posted by Gibbie

I say trained. Mythbusters trained goldfish once. It can be done. I forget why they were trying it. Maybe something like this.

Gibbie

Mythbusters wanted to see if goldfish could remember things (episode 11). They were able to train them to go through a "maze" to get to food. Technically, they split the challenge but I can't recall who "won" (I think it was Jamie, though). That was more a matter of training style though.

As for the OP, I have no clue. Something about it does not feel right, though.

[UEL]

While in my preteens, I had a relatively large fish tank. In it I had goldfish, and almost every morning two of them (the same two) would be doing laps of the tank at about the half way up mark, one behind the other.

It was as if they synchronised their performances.

I got so used to it that I thought it was common for all goldfish. Boy was I disappointed.

[ganzfeld]

With the apparent shallowness of the tank, I wouldn't discount the magnet theory. That would be easier than both training or video tricks. (I'm going to guess that they wouldn't put video tricks on a TV show but they wouldn't be beyond doing the magnet trick.) I wonder if there is any way to get strong magnets or iron filings into the fish to do this, for example by feeding them iron.

[Special T]

Originally Posted by Lady Neeva

On the other hand, they appear to be fantail goldfish, and that variety doesn't tend to be able to move very fast. And when they are swimming as fast as they can, there is a lot more "wiggle" going on -- they have big egg shaped bodies, short stubby tails, and an extra tailfin weighing them down.

I agree. I have never seen fantails that are that coordinated. Their deformities pretty much prohibit smooth movement. And the fish in the video don't look like any other kind. Goldfish will school, but again not in such a coordinated fashion.

I don't really have any theories on how it might have been faked, though.