Being a blind cave fish.

So why do I care so much about blind cave fish. These fish are certainly not the most attractive fish. They are not interesting fish to watch parenting. And the mexican blind cave fish I own are not rare. But to me they are the most fascinating fish I could own. (I dream of owning a variety of blind cave fish species)

Part of me loves them because they can be so controversial (link) but manly I am fascinated by them for one simple reason. Their disability does not restrict them.

I work for a small charity with limited funds and big aims. Part of me job involves me creating solutions to problems with limited resources. Solutions need to be effective and affordable. Consider the blind cave fishes biggest potential problem, navigation. They can't see were they are going but they have the most effective lateral line system and a brain adapted to be more effective at navigation then dogs. No light in caves meant the eyes weren't needed and could be just a waste of energy and a weak spot so the eyes were out and went with a different system. I aim to bring that attitude to my work. Honestly addressing the situation by identifying the needs and discovering the solution that would work. Ignoring the temptation to try the normal regular method.

Regular doesn't always work and I want to live in situations were the regular isn't working. I want to try and find the irregular solutions to regular problems in the caves of the world.

- Posted on the go

Comments

Fishkeeping in a Cambodian Rice Field

Improving subsistence farmers diet with fish husbandry in Cambodia How can a bunch of fish ponds make a real difference? This summer I am travelling around South-East Asia, including Cambodia. In Cambodia I will be visiting some NGOs and voluntary aid projects . I meet with our main contact this week and most of the work is focused on people projects, teaching English, prison visits , drug addiction etc but they mentioned one project where they help rice farmers start fish husbandry projects. These projects are designed to help the local subsistence farmers grow on fish to adult size for increasing the protein component of their diet. Being interested in all forms of fish keeping I hope that when we travel to Cambodia I can visit the project or at least meet up with the team managing the project. It sounds like a fascinating and practical way to help some of the worlds poorest improve th...

Fish growing in an elephants footprint

Killifish are beautiful and fascinating After watching this video they have now moved up to the top of my Fish wish list . Next time I get to set up a new tank these will be in it! Currently I am not sure if I would want to start with an annual or a non-annual variety but I am very attracted to the colouration of the Blue Lyretail . These small fish seem both tough and clever at avoiding predators (see the water scorpion in video), catching prey and breeding. The video shows some annual Killifish displaying there amazing ability to have eggs laid in damp mud wait for water to return and then hatch. This curious ability allows these fish to thrive in areas with varying water levels. Their annual breeding ability also allows their eggs to be swapped, traded and sent by post between breeder and collectors both across a country and internationally. Their annual nature greatly appeals to me as a project that allows me to view a compl...

<b>Full to the top or a ghost town</b> For the first time in my professional career I ran an open community youth club on Halloween. Normally Halloween falls during school half term and as we follow school opening it has never happened before. We opened knowing that Halloween may have unusual impacts on numbers. We didn't know if the festival would encourage lots of people out of houses and therefore increase numbers or would people all have parties to attend and trick or treating to do and therefore decrease numbers? We opened the club not knowing what to expect in attendance or behaviour. After being open for 30 minutes we had our answer. No one was coming. Not a single young person walked through our door. Our club was empty so we went out and did some detached youth work. We learnt a lesson about working on Halloween. But this night got me thinking is it better to have too few or too many young people in a youth club? When you have too many young people in a youth ...

BlindFish Ideas

Search This Blog