Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1890-02-14

QUEER FISHES.
singular Exhibitions of Breathing Habits
aud Climbing PropensIties.


region,we meet with singular exhibitions Of
breathing habits, writes DR.. Andrew Will
son, F. r. S. e F. l.. S., in Once a Week.
1t is known of these fishes that they can
survive long periods of dryness, living as
they do in the semi-huid mud of rivers and
lakes. Often they may be found lying dor
mant beneath the "hard-baked crusts of the
bottom of tank, from which every drop of
water has disappeared" Now, In these
f1shess it is clear breathing must be largely
suspended, and life goes on at very low
pressure, so TO speak; but so long as the
mud is soft enough, these fishes can be
| seen to rise to the surface at intervals to
gulp in air. That is to say, when hard
pressed for water, these fishes have devel-
oped habit of using air taken directly
from the atmosphere for the purpose of
| purifying their blood-a function naturally
carried on by their Rills. They have con-
verted themselves, for the time being, into
land-animals. Nor is this ALL These
"snake-headed" fishes of India, while en-
joying their ordinary life in the water, are
are also seen to gulp down air from the at
mosphere. DIR. Day tells us that this habit
is to be regularly observed in these fishes.
He adds the interesting observation that if
net be suspended below the surface Of the
water of the vessel in which they are con-
tanned, so as to prevent the fishes from ris-
ing to the top of the water TO breathe in the
air, they will actually perish and die by suf-
location. So that Just as ordinary fishes
die suffocated out of the water, these fishes
perish from like cause if they are kept in
the water.
Another and nearly related division of
fishes includes the climbing perch of India
and it's neighbors In 1871, one Daldorf, in
a paper read before the Linn3an Society of
London, detailed the fact that he had cap
tured cllmblngperch (or Anabas) while
the fish was climbing palm.tree growing
near a pond The fish had attained a
height of five feet above the water, and was
proceeding to higher level still. BY aid
of the spines in front of its gill covers, it
held on to the trees bark, 1t then bent its
TAIL and inserted into the bark its hinder
tail-spines. Thus fixing the hinder part of
the body as kind of fulcrum or support,
the fish then released it's head, and made
further ascent by Strengthening it's body
In the Malay tongue the fish has been named
the stree. climber" and it is known to
walk, or rather to waddle, over the land in
search of fresh ponds and pools. The gils
are kept moist in its land Journeys by pc
culiar arrangement of the bones of the
head. These bones are greatly twisted
and contorted, and serve apparently either
to retain moisture for the giils, or to hold
supply of air sufficient for the breathing
operations of the fish.
But excelling in interest, even the curious
fishes just named, we find the Lepidosiren,
or mud-fsh, of the Amazon and Gambia
rivers, and the Ceratodus, or "Barramun-
da," of the rivers of Queensland In most
ordinary fishes, such as the cod, salmon,
herring, etc, an organ called the air-blad-
der, swimmin g-bladder, or sound exists.
The use of this organ is apparently that Of
enabling the fish to rise or to sink in the
water, by releasing or COMPRISING the
gases the "sound" contains. This bladder
varies very much in shape and conforma-
tion, and in some cases it is seen to commu-
nicate with the throat of the fish by means
Of a duct or tube. In decp-sea fishes the
gas contained in the bladder is mostly
oxygen, while in fresh-water fishes much
nitrogen with little oxygen and carbonic
acid gas are found These 0nses a',',oo~ -
he secreted or formed by the alr-tladder
itself In some ordinary fishes, in which a
dense network of blood-vessels exists in
connection with the air-bladder, we may
readily believe that this organ may assist
in purifying the blood.
In certain fishes, however not only does
the air. bladder become lung-like in struct-
ire, but it also discharges the duties OF
ung, in that it receives impure or venohs
)lood from the body and returns 1T to the
)ody in purified condition. The Ceratodus
# Queensland has thus an air-bladder
which is a true lung. 1t rises to the sur
face of the water and fills this lung, then
lescends and remains below water until
ihe air it has inhaled has become ex-
hausted. The fish possesses also fuQy-de-
veloped gllls, and we may hold that these
organs are it's natural breathing organs
while it inhabts the water, although it is
equally obvious that the lung ike air-bladder
must constitute its means of breathing,w when
from any circumstances the gills are unable
10 perform their work. AS Dr. Gunther
tells us, the Barramunda "can breathe
either by gills or lungs alone, or by both
The Lepidosirens, or "mud fishes" on
the other hand, are more decidedly lung
breathers than the Ceratodus. For their
air-bladder is really double lung, purify
ing impure blood, IN the absence of water,
in which medium alone their gills can act
efficiently. In the dry seasons of the year
these mud fishes appear to be dried up
with the mud of the pools or lakes they
nhabit. They coil head and tail together,
md exist thus inside cavity or receptacle
lOllOWSu III lh0 luuu, WulCu may COHuuui'
cate with the outer air by an aperture or
channel. These fishes are dug out of the
mud, and are often sent TO Europe packed,
as it were, by nature, within their mud in
vestments, and existing thus inside veri-
table ball of dry clay, whence they are re-
leased by sleeping the clay in tepid water.
In this state it is evident the breathing
must be of strcIly atmospheric type.
There can be no use for gills in a fish while
it is spending part of its life in dried and
dessicated state,
Hence, the lung-like air-bladder must
perform all the functions of breathing. the
gills resuming their duties, doubtless,
when the wet season dissolves the clay and
when the fish returns to its native waters.
We witness in such case the stages by
which the type of water life can be, and
probably has been, modified into the type
of land life Anyone who sees a frog be
gin life as tadpole, breathing with gills,
and ending its existence as an nair-Ureathing
frog, may think of the mud fishes, and note
how lower life often successfully aspires
TO attain higher stage Of existence.
Unole MedilI and the Reporter.