Underwater and Underrated

THERE’S A MYTH that the memory of a goldfish lasts only three seconds. But that wasn’t how Professor Culum Brown saw it when he was 12. He kept fish as pets and would while away the hours staring at them instead of doing his homework. The more he stared, the more they fascinated him. What he found most intriguing was the way they seemed to recognise and react to him.

“They ignored everybody else and they knew that in the morning when I came to feed them I’d put the food in a particular spot and they’d be there waiting,” he says. “It was pretty obvious to me, even as a kid, that they were much smarter than people thought.”

Culum went on to snorkel a lot during his youth in Southeast Asia, where his father worked, and is now a marine biologist at Macquarie University, Sydney. “Most people are oblivious to what goes on in the water,” he says. “The more I looked into it, the more I realised nobody knew much about it. That was a kind of inspiration. I never set out to be a marine biologist, but that’s where life took me.”

For some 20 years now, his focus has been on fish intelligence and cognition. With numerous journal articles and a major book on the topic, he’s considered Australia’s leading expert. “There was never any doubt in my mind that fish are clever. It was just a question of how clever,” Culum says. “I guess I’m still answering that question.”

ALL VERTEBRATE ANIMALS, including fish and humans, descended from a common ancestor. The former belong to a numerous and successful group that originated more than