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My babies are getting more and more friendly towards me each day. Every time I lean over into their bin to look at them, they scurry over to come see me with their necks puffed out. So I'm just wondering, how well can they see? Can they see a difference between me and other people? Do they have a memory span? Or do they mostly work off of their sense of smell?

They have keen eyesight, particularly for longer distances (to slide away from predators). I believe that they do recognize different people, especially the person who is their main food source. They do have a memory span, how long, I don't know (a goldfish has a 3-second memory span). They're a bit nearsighted and don't have great depth perception. In locating food in the water they rely more on their sense of smell.

ah cool. Thanks!

Never knew a gold fish only had a 3 second memory span.

Ranger The Red Ear Slider wrote:Never knew a gold fish only had a 3 second memory span.

The don't, its a myth, one that was busted by the mythbusters.

Fish generally have a 3 minute memory span.

On Mythbusters (I know, far from true scientific research) they trained fish to swim through a maze to get their food. Jamie put colored rings around the holes in the maze and the goldfish learned to go through for food. The 'untrained' fish just swam into the plexiglass over and over. They said it took about a week to get the fish to recognize orange circle = food. But they could come back every night at feeding time, and the fish would go right through the maze for the food.

Hah.. i'm pretty sure there's a scientific article on the goldfish memory subject. If I find it i'll post it.

My gold fish know me lol they come right to me. As for the turtles Mine can see me clear across the house. Very good eye site. Also they have great hearing too. Some times when the house is quiet and I say something, they jump in the water.

I came across that info on a weekly segment in the newspaper that was written by a vet. Perhaps the sec. was a typo or the vet needs to be clued in.

lol goldfish brains. fish can be conditioned after a while. but like they dont really remember exact locations or anything like that. it's more of instinctual needs and how to fufill them than memory