Fish Biology (Diploma in Ichthyology)AC606

Unit 1- Evolution and Speciation: The timescales involved in fish evolution - Rudimentary evolutionary lines in fish ancestry - The characteristics of the aquatic environment compared to the terrestrial environment - The basic influence such factors have on fish life - The distribution patterns in marine and freshwater environments -The term speciation - Speciation and the distribution patterns of fresh and marine water environments.

Unit 2 – History, Swim Bladder and Diversification: The basic concepts of early animal life - Historical aspects in the context of geological time periods - Different lines of fish evolution that emerged at separate times - The various factors that contributed to the primary extinctions of ichthyological history - Swim bladder evolution along with other adaptations promoted the survival of the bony fish - The common chondrichthian evolution as related to dentition - The diverse nature of the bony fish group.

Unit 3 - Bouyancy: The importance of buoyancy maintenance - The relevance of maintaining low density compounds within the body in order to reduce the likelihood of sinking - Lateral fins to obtain lift in the water column -The role of the swim bladder in promoting the dispersion and diversity of the bony fish - The role of the physoclistous swim bladder in enabling swim bladder buoyancy control to be achieved at great depth - The advantages obtained from using the physoclistous swim bladder arrangement - The physoclistous gas gland arrangement

Unit 4 – Fish Communication: Fish communication is multi faceted - Pheromones which are used in predator avoidance, recognition and reproduction - Stridulation as a method used for making sound - Swim bladder use in amplifying sound – Colour’s part in fish communication - The mechanisms involved with colour communication, such as chromatophore use

Unit 5 – Reproduction: The basic level of parental care and the conflicts of which parent provides care – Sex change to maximise fitness - Balon’s classification and the high level of diversity - Oviparity as egg laying – Guarding and non-guarders as methods of maximising reproductive success – Fish which bear young rather than lay eggs

Unit 6 – Migration: Fish migration is loosely categorised according to fresh and saltwater location - The terms oceanodromy, potadromy and diadromy as applied to fish migration - The eel as an example of catadromous fish and the salmon as an anadromous fish - The concept of amphidrophy - Why juvenile and adult life stages often have separate locations - The various navigational methods employed by fish.

Unit 7 – Breathing: Gaseous exchange is essential for survival - Gill structure and ventilation has an influence on the nature of the gas exchange between water and blood in fish - Cutaneous respiration and appreciate the normal limits of such a strategy - The heart as a basic pump, and appreciate the anatomical differences between elasmobranch and teleost hearts.

Unit 8 –The environment: The long history of fish evolution and the adaptability that this time span encourage – The Antarctic and Arctic habitats - The notothenioid antifreeze adaptation - The term endemic - The different deep-sea zones and the differences in fauna that they encourage.

Unit 9 – Senses: The lateral line as a sense organ and understand its relevance to survival - The basic mechanism of the neuromast - The acoustico-lateralis system as a composition of two senses - Electro reception occurs in a diverse amount of ways and understand the survival advantage it can provide - The basic revision of the visual senses.