View allAll Photos Tagged autonomy
The only way to beat fascists like Gri££in and The Red fascists front of The SWP/UAF or any politician is to organise in working-class communities and fight for working-class autonomy. NOBODY ELSE IS GOING TO FIGHT FOR US
Critical Art Ensemble & Institute for Applied Autonomy
Seized
Aksioma Project Space
Komenskega 18, Ljubljana
13 - 29 June 2012
Production: Aksioma - Institute for Contemporary Art, Ljubljana, 2012
Photo: Janez Janša
June 24, Philadelphia, PA
Rally June 24 demanding abortion rights, trans rights, and bodily autonomy for all by opposing the anti-abortion “march for life” on the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.
The rally and speakout started at Franklin Square (200 N. 6th St) and then marched to defend patients accessing health care at a nearby abortion provider under threat of anti-abortion fascists.
In the current legislative session, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or are advancing in nearly every state. These bills contain measures from bans on gender affirming care to censorship laws prohibiting discussions in schools about LGBTQ+ people. On June 6, the Human Rights Campaign declared a national state of emergency for LGBTQ+ individuals.
Since the Dobbs decision one year ago, fourteen states have implemented complete abortion bans, and several other states have attempted or are still attempting to implement bans. The criminalization of abortion and gender affirming care are attacks on our bodily autonomy and our ability to access necessary health care.
We MUST fight back against these attacks on human rights and the complacency that allows them to continue and escalate.
5. jūnijā Rīgā tika atklāta bezpilota lidaparātu ražošanas uzņēmuma “Edge Autonomy” jaunā ražotne.
Pasākumā piedalījās arī Aizsardzības ministrijas valsts sekretārs Aivars Puriņš.
Foto: Gatis Dieziņš (Aizsardzības ministrija)
5. jūnijā Rīgā tika atklāta bezpilota lidaparātu ražošanas uzņēmuma “Edge Autonomy” jaunā ražotne.
Pasākumā piedalījās arī Aizsardzības ministrijas valsts sekretārs Aivars Puriņš.
Foto: Gatis Dieziņš (Aizsardzības ministrija)
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Barcelona, July 10
The 2010 Catalan autonomy protest was a demonstration in central Barcelona on 10 July 2010 against limitations of the autonomy of Catalonia with Spain, and particularly against a recent decision of the Spanish Constitutional Court to annul or reinterpret several articles of the 2006 Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia.
Source: livinghistories.newcastle.edu.au/nodes/view/7637
Students 'kidnap' Lord Mayor - 3rd July 1968. Newcastle Morning Herald.
This image was digitised as part of the UoN50 Project.
Students “kidnap Lord Mayor
The Lord Mayor of Newcastle (Ald. McDougall) was “kidnapped’ by University of Newcastle
students yesterday.
The “kidnapping” was a prelude to Autonomy Day Celebration the students will hold today.
Six students walked into the Lord Mayor’s office and quietly asked him to go with them.
He was taken under escort to a car waiting at the city Hall steps and driven away.
Ald. McDougall had to attend a city Council meet night.
“Ransom” paid
He said last night that he “begged” for immediate release and offered to pay the students $50 “ransom.”
“The students seemed agreeably surprised by my offer, accepted it and quickly returned me to the City Hall. “he said.
Funds raised by the Autonomy Day celebrations will be used to help build an aboriginal hostel at Cardiff.
--5" x 5" canvas
--acrylic
--background of yellow, blue, and green
--foreground of black
--based on the theme of "Autonomy" for a swap with Syd
This won't go up on etsy as it's on its way to Syd. There's no right or wrong way for it to go.
The day began with us not knowing what to do, and by midday were on the top of a hill surrounded by stone towers and thousands of tourists.
Welcome to San Gimignano.
Not sure whether the plethora of towers here is the result of penis envy or something similar, or that they great and the good liked to look down on everyone else, and that meant building skyscrapers, long before the term was thought of.
Towers, let us not forget, that erupt from the stone buildings of a hilltop fortress, so are lofty indeed, and you'd need locks of great length for you prince to climb up some of these.
I had not been here before, but suspected it a tourist trap, so we had to leave early in order to get a parking spot. Yes, in the 16 years since we were last here, tourism in Tuscany seems to have gotten really popular, in most cases, more popular than the infrastructure can stand, but still the people keep coming.
Including us.
Tuscan us not large, distances, as the Tuscan crow flies are modest, and yet travelling 50 miles to Florence or San Gimignano takes 90 minutes or more, as roads twist and turn up and down mountains, through woods and picturesque hilltop villages.
Everything takes time, so it had better be worth doing, and doing well.
Some Italians. Some, like to tear around the place like their in Monza even if they're driving a 20 year old Jimny, and when they come up against the Englishman abroad in his Audi, they sit three inches from the back bumper. So I brake. Sharp. And wave them past, usually passing them in the next village talking with their Nonna.
And so it goes.
We set out at half eight-ish, heading up through the hills past Siena and nearly into Florence, up and down, round and round the roads went, and I kept to them.
Which was nice.
West of Florence, we joined the train of traffic heading up the hill to San Gimignano.
At the top there are three car parks, two big ones a smaller on between. The smaller one had 26 spaces, so we went in, and after driving round and round, we found the lower level and some spaces.
So I parked in carefully the space at the end so whoever parked next would have plenty of space, and leave space for us to get back into the car.
That was the plan.
From there it was a short walk to the city gates, and already the main street leading to the piazzas with the towers was already pretty busy.
However, we had made it, it was just after ten, so we stopped at the first place for breakfast: a fresh roll with Tuscan preserved meats and a strong coffee.
And then up to the squares. A bit of a climb in the warm, nearly hot morning. But we made it fine, then in the square, the guided tours had begun. I mean, I don't mean to be rude, but if can't guide yourself round a small hilltop village with a book, then you really shouldn't leave your house.
But I digress.
The first square is entered through a large arch, it is surround by impossibly old buildings, most with a tower, double or triple its height, then on and up to the second square, were the Cathedral looks down on not just the town, but all of creation.
Thankfully, its just a fiver to get in. I queue to buy tickets, then through the gates and into the cool dark space beyond.
Its walls are covered in frescoes. The south wall with scenes from the Passion, and the North had at least one scene from Exodus and the fleeing across the Dead Sea.
And it wasn't that crowded, in fact at times there was just half a dozen of us in there. So I take as many shots as I want, and we leave by the front door, the square laid out below us.
So, we people watch.
Jools comes back to say she has found a place to eat, so I follow here down a steep alley to a small door with two chairs and tables, but inside its larger, and no other customers.
We were offered a table, and from the brief menu we order the Charcuterie board which I followed with roast suckling pig and vegetables.
The starter was excellent, made so with a small jar of local honey dropped on the meat, but the main, and I know what suckling pig means, was delicious, and was the house speciality. And washed down with a glass of Brunello for a fiver, was a bargain.
We walked back down through the town, through the gate to the car. Where someone had had parked so close i couldn't get in, and Jools only just managed it.
But we got the car out, loaded it with supplies, and we high-tailed it out, down the hill and back towards Roccastrada.
The same hills, the same bends, the same villages. And the same occasional inpatient local drivers.
We went to the CoOp again, as we needed fruit. Cheese. Bread. Wine. White wine. Pasta. Passata.
Jools went for a wander and bought two more artisan ice creams, which would defrost on the way back to the apartment.
Then we could eat and enjoy. And relax.
Which we did.
It was five in the afternoon, clouds were building. But it was the weekend. Apparently.
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The Collegiata di Santa Maria Assunta or Duomo di San Gimignano is a Roman Catholic collegiate church and minor basilica[1] in San Gimignano, in Tuscany in central Italy. It contains important cycles of Renaissance frescoes by artists including Domenico Ghirlandaio, Benozzo Gozzoli, Taddeo di Bartolo, Lippo Memmi and Bartolo di Fredi. It falls within the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the "Historic Centre of San Gimignano", with its frescoes being described by UNESCO as "works of outstanding beauty"
The first church on the site was begun in the 10th century.[3] During the early 12th century the importance of San Gimignano, and its principal church, grew steadily, owing to the town's location on the pilgrimage route to Rome, the Via Francigena.[3] The present church on this site was consecrated on 21 November 1148 and dedicated to St. Geminianus (San Gimignano) in the presence of Pope Eugenius III and 14 prelates.[3] The event is commemorated in a plaque on the facade.[3] The power and authority of the city of San Gimignano continued to grow, until it was able to win autonomy from Volterra. The church owned land and enjoyed numerous privileges that were endorsed by papal bulls and decrees.[4] It was elevated to collegiate status 20 September 1471.[5]
During the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries, the church was enriched by the addition of frescos and sculpture.[4] The western end of the building (liturgical east) was altered and extended by Giuliano da Maiano between 1466 and 1468, with the work including vestries, the Chapel of Conception and the Chapel of St Fina.[3] The church was damaged during World War II, and during the subsequent restoration in 1951 the triapsidal eastern end of the earlier church was discovered lying beneath the nave of the present church.[3]
The church possesses the relics of St. Geminianus, the beatified Bishop of Modena and patron saint of the town, whose feast day is celebrated on 31 January. On 8 May 1300 Dante Alighieri came to San Gimignano as the Ambassador of the Guelph League in Tuscany.[6] Girolamo Savonarola preached from the pulpit of this church in 1497.
The Collegiate Church stands on the west side of Piazza del Duomo, so named although the church has never been the seat of a bishop.[7] The church has an east-facing facade, and chancel to the west, as at St Peter's Basilica. The architecture is 12th and 13th century Romanesque with the exception of the two chapels in the Renaissance style. The facade, which has little ornament, is approached from the square by a wide staircase and has a door into each of the side aisles, but no central portal. The doorways are surmounted by stone lintels with recessed arches above them, unusual in incorporating the stone Gabbro.[8] There is a central ocular window at the end of the nave and a smaller one giving light to each aisle. The facade, which is stone, was raised higher in brick in 1340, when the ribbed vaulting was constructed, and the two smaller ocular windows set in.[7] Matteo di Brunisend is generally credited as the main architect of the medieval period, with his date of activity given as 1239, but in fact his contribution may have been little more than the design of the central ocular window.[8] Beneath this window is a slot which marks the place of a window which lit the chancel of the earlier church, and may be the most visible sign of the church's reorientation in the 12th century rebuilding, although this is not entirely agreed upon by scholars.[8]
To the north side of the church, in the corner of the transept and chancel, stands a severely plain campanile of square plan, with a single arched opening in each face. The campanile may be that of the earlier church, as it appears to mark the extent of the original western facade, or it may have been one of the city's many tower houses, pressed into service of the church. To the south side of the church is the Loggia of the Baptistry, a 14th-century arcaded cloister with stout octagonal columns and a groin vault.[9]
Internally, the building is in the shape of a Latin Cross, with central nave and an aisle on either side, divided by arcades of seven semi-circular Romanesque arches resting on columns with simplified Corinthianesque capitals.[10] The chancel is a simple rectangle with a single arched window at the terminal end. The roofs throughout are of quadripartite vaults which date from the mid 14th century.[7] Although Gothic by date and decoration, the profiles of the ribs are semi-circular in the Romanesque manner. The clerestory has small windows, inserted when the nave was vaulted, along with lancet windows in the north aisle, the aisle windows were subsequently blocked for the painting of the fresco cycle, making the interior very dark.
The Romanesque architectural details of the church's interior are emphasised by the decorative use of colour, with the voussoirs of the nave arcades being of alternately black and white marble, creating stripes, as seen at Orvieto Cathedral. The vault compartments are all painted with lapis lazuli dotted with gold stars, and the vaulting ribs are emphasised with bands of geometric decoration predominantly in red, white and gold.
The church is most famous for its largely intact scheme of fresco decoration, the greater part of which dates from the 14th century, and represents the work of painters of the Sienese school, influenced by the Byzantine traditions of Duccio and the Early Renaissance developments of Giotto. The frescoes comprise a Poor Man's Bible of Old Testament cycle, New Testament cycle, and Last Judgement, as well as an Annunciation, a Saint Sebastian, and the stories of a local saint, St Fina, as well as several smaller works.
The wall of the left aisle had six decorated bays, of which the paintings of the first bay are in poor condition and those of the sixth have been damaged and in part destroyed by the insertion of the pipe organ. The remaining paintings, with the exception of a repainted panel in the sixth bay, are the work of Bartolo di Fredi, and, according to an inscription, were completed around 1356.[11] The paintings are in three registers and proceed from left to right chronologically in each register.
Upper level
The upper register occupies the lunettes beneath the vault and depicts the story of Creation.[11]
Creation of the Firmament
Creation of Man
Adam names the animals
Creation of Eve
God commands Adam and Eve not to touch the forbidden fruit
The Original Sin (lost)
Middle level
The second register has ten remaining scenes, with two at the furthest right having been lost with the insertion of the organ.[11]
The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden (very incomplete)
Cain kills Abel (very incomplete)
Noah and his family building the Ark
Animals entering the Ark
Noah and his family giving thanks after the Great Flood
The Drunkenness of Noah
The departure of Abraham and Lot from the land of the Chaldeans
Abraham and Lot go separate ways.
Joseph's dream
Joseph is put into a well by his brothers
Story of Joseph in Egypt (lost)
Story of Joseph in Egypt (lost)
Lower level
In the lower register, there are ten scenes.[11]
Joseph, has his brothers arrested (very incomplete)
Joseph makes his identity known to his family (incomplete)
Moses changes the rod into a serpent
The army of Pharaoh are drowned in the Red Sea. (this scene occupies two sections)
Moses on Mount Sinai
The devil is sent to Job by God
The men and herds of Job are killed
The house of Job falls, killing his sons.
Job prays to God
Job, plagued by boils, is visited by friends. (incomplete)
(Lost scene)
New Testament cycle
The six decorated bays of the right aisle, with scenes of the New Testament, pose a problem of authorship. Giorgio Vasari states that they are the work of "Barna of Siena" and relates that Barna fell to his death from the scaffolding.[12] The name "Barna" in relation to paintings at the Collegiate Church of San Gimignano appears to have originated in Lorenzo Ghiberti's Commentaries. In 1927 the archivist Peleo Bacci made the suggestion that Barna had never existed and that the paintings are the work of Lippo Memmi. This hypothesis received no support and little comment for fifty years.[13] In 1976 discussion of Bacci's attribution was revived, with Moran suggesting that there had been a mis-transcription of "Bartolo" as "Barna", with the name "Bartolo" referring to Bartolo di Fredi, painter of the Old Testament cycle.[14]
The attribution of the New Testament cycle to Lippo Memmi, perhaps assisted by his brother Federico Memmi and father Memmo di Filippucci, is now generally agreed.[13] Lippo Memmi was influenced by his more famous brother-in-law, Simone Martini.[7] Lippo Memmi also painted a large Maesta in the Town Hall of San Gimignano, in imitation of that done by Simone Martini at the Town Hall of Siena. The New Testament cycle of the right aisle appears to pre-date the Old Testament cycle and is generally accepted to date from c.1335-1345.[15]
The scenes within the New Testament cycle are organised into four separate narratives, and do not follow a clear left-to-right pattern as do those of the left aisle. As with the left aisle, they are divided into three registers, the upper being the lunettes between the vaults.
Upper level
The upper register shows the Birth of Christ. The series reads from right to left, in six bays.[15]
The Annunciation
The Nativity and adoration of the shepherds
The adoration of the Magi
The Presentation at the Temple
The Massacre of the Innocents
The Flight into Egypt
Middle level
The middle register shows scenes of the Life of Christ, beginning at the 4th bay, below the picture of the Presentation at the Temple, and reading left to right, with eight scenes.[15] The scenes have been skilfully juxtaposed so that narrative elements may be compared or contrasted. Within the fourth bay is shown the Presentation of the Temple, Jesus sitting among the Doctors of the Temple of Jerusalem as a twelve-year-old, and Jesus before his crucifixion, enthroned, crowned with thorns and mocked.[15]
Jesus among the Doctors of the Temple of Jerusalem
The Baptism of Jesus
The Calling of Peter
The Wedding at Cana of Galilee (damaged in WWII)
The Transfiguration
The Resurrection of Lazarus
Jesus enters Jerusalem
The people welcome Jesus to Jerusalem (the final two scenes are a single event spread over two frames)
Lower level
The lower register, showing the Passion of Christ, continues beneath the Entry into Jerusalem, and is read from right to left in eight scenes over four bays.[15]
The Last Supper
Judas agrees to betray Jesus for thirty pieces of silver
Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane
The Kiss of Judas
Jesus at the Praetorium
The Scourging of Jesus
Jesus crowned with thorns and mocked
Jesus carrying the cross to Calvary
Bays five and six
Bay five, beneath the lunette of the Slaughter of the Innocents, has a single large scene of the Crucifixion.[15]
Bay six, beneath the lunette of the Flight into Egypt contained four scenes (destroyed in the 15th century) of post-crucifixion events[15] which are thought to have been:
The Deposition
The Descent into Limbo
The Resurrection
Pentecost
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collegiata_di_Santa_Maria_Assunta,_...
Source: livinghistories.newcastle.edu.au/nodes/view/7665
Publicity Aims On Autonomy - 26th July 1960. Newcastle Morning Herald.
This image was digitised as part of the UoN50 Project.
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June 24, Philadelphia, PA
Rally June 24 demanding abortion rights, trans rights, and bodily autonomy for all by opposing the anti-abortion “march for life” on the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.
The rally and speakout started at Franklin Square (200 N. 6th St) and then marched to defend patients accessing health care at a nearby abortion provider under threat of anti-abortion fascists.
In the current legislative session, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or are advancing in nearly every state. These bills contain measures from bans on gender affirming care to censorship laws prohibiting discussions in schools about LGBTQ+ people. On June 6, the Human Rights Campaign declared a national state of emergency for LGBTQ+ individuals.
Since the Dobbs decision one year ago, fourteen states have implemented complete abortion bans, and several other states have attempted or are still attempting to implement bans. The criminalization of abortion and gender affirming care are attacks on our bodily autonomy and our ability to access necessary health care.
We MUST fight back against these attacks on human rights and the complacency that allows them to continue and escalate.
BOLIVIA, SANTA CRUZ, May 4, 2008, Police officer shows slingshot seized from protester in Plan Tres Mil neighbourhood. /Franz Chávez/IPS
June 24, Philadelphia, PA
Rally June 24 demanding abortion rights, trans rights, and bodily autonomy for all by opposing the anti-abortion “march for life” on the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.
The rally and speakout started at Franklin Square (200 N. 6th St) and then marched to defend patients accessing health care at a nearby abortion provider under threat of anti-abortion fascists.
In the current legislative session, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or are advancing in nearly every state. These bills contain measures from bans on gender affirming care to censorship laws prohibiting discussions in schools about LGBTQ+ people. On June 6, the Human Rights Campaign declared a national state of emergency for LGBTQ+ individuals.
Since the Dobbs decision one year ago, fourteen states have implemented complete abortion bans, and several other states have attempted or are still attempting to implement bans. The criminalization of abortion and gender affirming care are attacks on our bodily autonomy and our ability to access necessary health care.
We MUST fight back against these attacks on human rights and the complacency that allows them to continue and escalate.
Source: livinghistories.newcastle.edu.au/nodes/view/7631
Autonomy Day plans - 10th July 1970. Newcastle Morning Herald.
This image was digitised as part of the UoN50 Project.
June 24, Philadelphia, PA
Rally June 24 demanding abortion rights, trans rights, and bodily autonomy for all by opposing the anti-abortion “march for life” on the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.
The rally and speakout started at Franklin Square (200 N. 6th St) and then marched to defend patients accessing health care at a nearby abortion provider under threat of anti-abortion fascists.
In the current legislative session, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or are advancing in nearly every state. These bills contain measures from bans on gender affirming care to censorship laws prohibiting discussions in schools about LGBTQ+ people. On June 6, the Human Rights Campaign declared a national state of emergency for LGBTQ+ individuals.
Since the Dobbs decision one year ago, fourteen states have implemented complete abortion bans, and several other states have attempted or are still attempting to implement bans. The criminalization of abortion and gender affirming care are attacks on our bodily autonomy and our ability to access necessary health care.
We MUST fight back against these attacks on human rights and the complacency that allows them to continue and escalate.
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June 24, Philadelphia, PA
Rally June 24 demanding abortion rights, trans rights, and bodily autonomy for all by opposing the anti-abortion “march for life” on the one-year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.
The rally and speakout started at Franklin Square (200 N. 6th St) and then marched to defend patients accessing health care at a nearby abortion provider under threat of anti-abortion fascists.
In the current legislative session, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been proposed or are advancing in nearly every state. These bills contain measures from bans on gender affirming care to censorship laws prohibiting discussions in schools about LGBTQ+ people. On June 6, the Human Rights Campaign declared a national state of emergency for LGBTQ+ individuals.
Since the Dobbs decision one year ago, fourteen states have implemented complete abortion bans, and several other states have attempted or are still attempting to implement bans. The criminalization of abortion and gender affirming care are attacks on our bodily autonomy and our ability to access necessary health care.
We MUST fight back against these attacks on human rights and the complacency that allows them to continue and escalate.
Fish, any of approximately 34,000 species of vertebrate animals (phylum Chordata) found in the fresh and salt waters of the world. Living species range from the primitive jawless lampreys and hagfishes through the cartilaginous sharks, skates, and rays to the abundant and diverse bony fishes. Most fish species are cold-blooded; however, one species, the opah (Lampris guttatus), is warm-blooded.
The term fish is applied to a variety of vertebrates of several evolutionary lines. It describes a life-form rather than a taxonomic group. As members of the phylum Chordata, fish share certain features with other vertebrates. These features are gill slits at some point in the life cycle, a notochord, or skeletal supporting rod, a dorsal hollow nerve cord, and a tail. Living fishes represent some five classes, which are as distinct from one another as are the four classes of familiar air-breathing animals—amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. For example, the jawless fishes (Agnatha) have gills in pouches and lack limb girdles. Extant agnathans are the lampreys and the hagfishes. As the name implies, the skeletons of fishes of the class Chondrichthyes (from chondr, “cartilage,” and ichthyes, “fish”) are made entirely of cartilage. Modern fish of this class lack a swim bladder, and their scales and teeth are made up of the same placoid material. Sharks, skates, and rays are examples of cartilaginous fishes. The bony fishes are by far the largest class. Examples range from the tiny seahorse to the 450-kg (1,000-pound) blue marlin, from the flattened soles and flounders to the boxy puffers and ocean sunfishes. Unlike the scales of the cartilaginous fishes, those of bony fishes, when present, grow throughout life and are made up of thin overlapping plates of bone. Bony fishes also have an operculum that covers the gill slits.
The study of fishes, the science of ichthyology, is of broad importance. Fishes are of interest to humans for many reasons, the most important being their relationship with and dependence on the environment. A more obvious reason for interest in fishes is their role as a moderate but important part of the world’s food supply. This resource, once thought unlimited, is now realized to be finite and in delicate balance with the biological, chemical, and physical factors of the aquatic environment. Overfishing, pollution, and alteration of the environment are the chief enemies of proper fisheries management, both in fresh waters and in the ocean. (For a detailed discussion of the technology and economics of fisheries, see commercial fishing.) Another practical reason for studying fishes is their use in disease control. As predators on mosquito larvae, they help curb malaria and other mosquito-borne diseases.
Fishes are valuable laboratory animals in many aspects of medical and biological research. For example, the readiness of many fishes to acclimate to captivity has allowed biologists to study behaviour, physiology, and even ecology under relatively natural conditions. Fishes have been especially important in the study of animal behaviour, where research on fishes has provided a broad base for the understanding of the more flexible behaviour of the higher vertebrates. The zebra fish is used as a model in studies of gene expression.
There are aesthetic and recreational reasons for an interest in fishes. Millions of people keep live fishes in home aquariums for the simple pleasure of observing the beauty and behaviour of animals otherwise unfamiliar to them. Aquarium fishes provide a personal challenge to many aquarists, allowing them to test their ability to keep a small section of the natural environment in their homes. Sportfishing is another way of enjoying the natural environment, also indulged in by millions of people every year. Interest in aquarium fishes and sportfishing supports multimillion-dollar industries throughout the world.
Fishes have been in existence for more than 450 million years, during which time they have evolved repeatedly to fit into almost every conceivable type of aquatic habitat. In a sense, land vertebrates are simply highly modified fishes: when fishes colonized the land habitat, they became tetrapod (four-legged) land vertebrates. The popular conception of a fish as a slippery, streamlined aquatic animal that possesses fins and breathes by gills applies to many fishes, but far more fishes deviate from that conception than conform to it. For example, the body is elongate in many forms and greatly shortened in others; the body is flattened in some (principally in bottom-dwelling fishes) and laterally compressed in many others; the fins may be elaborately extended, forming intricate shapes, or they may be reduced or even lost; and the positions of the mouth, eyes, nostrils, and gill openings vary widely. Air breathers have appeared in several evolutionary lines.
Many fishes are cryptically coloured and shaped, closely matching their respective environments; others are among the most brilliantly coloured of all organisms, with a wide range of hues, often of striking intensity, on a single individual. The brilliance of pigments may be enhanced by the surface structure of the fish, so that it almost seems to glow. A number of unrelated fishes have actual light-producing organs. Many fishes are able to alter their coloration—some for the purpose of camouflage, others for the enhancement of behavioral signals.
Fishes range in adult length from less than 10 mm (0.4 inch) to more than 20 metres (60 feet) and in weight from about 1.5 grams (less than 0.06 ounce) to many thousands of kilograms. Some live in shallow thermal springs at temperatures slightly above 42 °C (100 °F), others in cold Arctic seas a few degrees below 0 °C (32 °F) or in cold deep waters more than 4,000 metres (13,100 feet) beneath the ocean surface. The structural and, especially, the physiological adaptations for life at such extremes are relatively poorly known and provide the scientifically curious with great incentive for study.
Almost all natural bodies of water bear fish life, the exceptions being very hot thermal ponds and extremely salt-alkaline lakes, such as the Dead Sea in Asia and the Great Salt Lake in North America. The present distribution of fishes is a result of the geological history and development of Earth as well as the ability of fishes to undergo evolutionary change and to adapt to the available habitats. Fishes may be seen to be distributed according to habitat and according to geographical area. Major habitat differences are marine and freshwater. For the most part, the fishes in a marine habitat differ from those in a freshwater habitat, even in adjacent areas, but some, such as the salmon, migrate from one to the other. The freshwater habitats may be seen to be of many kinds. Fishes found in mountain torrents, Arctic lakes, tropical lakes, temperate streams, and tropical rivers will all differ from each other, both in obvious gross structure and in physiological attributes. Even in closely adjacent habitats where, for example, a tropical mountain torrent enters a lowland stream, the fish fauna will differ. The marine habitats can be divided into deep ocean floors (benthic), mid-water oceanic (bathypelagic), surface oceanic (pelagic), rocky coast, sandy coast, muddy shores, bays, estuaries, and others. Also, for example, rocky coastal shores in tropical and temperate regions will have different fish faunas, even when such habitats occur along the same coastline.
Although much is known about the present geographical distribution of fishes, far less is known about how that distribution came about. Many parts of the fish fauna of the fresh waters of North America and Eurasia are related and undoubtedly have a common origin. The faunas of Africa and South America are related, extremely old, and probably an expression of the drifting apart of the two continents. The fauna of southern Asia is related to that of Central Asia, and some of it appears to have entered Africa. The extremely large shore-fish faunas of the Indian and tropical Pacific oceans comprise a related complex, but the tropical shore fauna of the Atlantic, although containing Indo-Pacific components, is relatively limited and probably younger. The Arctic and Antarctic marine faunas are quite different from each other. The shore fauna of the North Pacific is quite distinct, and that of the North Atlantic more limited and probably younger. Pelagic oceanic fishes, especially those in deep waters, are similar the world over, showing little geographical isolation in terms of family groups. The deep oceanic habitat is very much the same throughout the world, but species differences do exist, showing geographical areas determined by oceanic currents and water masses.
All aspects of the life of a fish are closely correlated with adaptation to the total environment, physical, chemical, and biological. In studies, all the interdependent aspects of fish, such as behaviour, locomotion, reproduction, and physical and physiological characteristics, must be taken into account.
Correlated with their adaptation to an extremely wide variety of habitats is the extremely wide variety of life cycles that fishes display. The great majority hatch from relatively small eggs a few days to several weeks or more after the eggs are scattered in the water. Newly hatched young are still partially undeveloped and are called larvae until body structures such as fins, skeleton, and some organs are fully formed. Larval life is often very short, usually less than a few weeks, but it can be very long, some lampreys continuing as larvae for at least five years. Young and larval fishes, before reaching sexual maturity, must grow considerably, and their small size and other factors often dictate that they live in a habitat different than that of the adults. For example, most tropical marine shore fishes have pelagic larvae. Larval food also is different, and larval fishes often live in shallow waters, where they may be less exposed to predators.
After a fish reaches adult size, the length of its life is subject to many factors, such as innate rates of aging, predation pressure, and the nature of the local climate. The longevity of a species in the protected environment of an aquarium may have nothing to do with how long members of that species live in the wild. Many small fishes live only one to three years at the most. In some species, however, individuals may live as long as 10 or 20 or even 100 years.
Fish behaviour is a complicated and varied subject. As in almost all animals with a central nervous system, the nature of a response of an individual fish to stimuli from its environment depends upon the inherited characteristics of its nervous system, on what it has learned from past experience, and on the nature of the stimuli. Compared with the variety of human responses, however, that of a fish is stereotyped, not subject to much modification by “thought” or learning, and investigators must guard against anthropomorphic interpretations of fish behaviour.
Fishes perceive the world around them by the usual senses of sight, smell, hearing, touch, and taste and by special lateral line water-current detectors. In the few fishes that generate electric fields, a process that might best be called electrolocation aids in perception. One or another of these senses often is emphasized at the expense of others, depending upon the fish’s other adaptations. In fishes with large eyes, the sense of smell may be reduced; others, with small eyes, hunt and feed primarily by smell (such as some eels).
Specialized behaviour is primarily concerned with the three most important activities in the fish’s life: feeding, reproduction, and escape from enemies. Schooling behaviour of sardines on the high seas, for instance, is largely a protective device to avoid enemies, but it is also associated with and modified by their breeding and feeding requirements. Predatory fishes are often solitary, lying in wait to dart suddenly after their prey, a kind of locomotion impossible for beaked parrot fishes, which feed on coral, swimming in small groups from one coral head to the next. In addition, some predatory fishes that inhabit pelagic environments, such as tunas, often school.
Sleep in fishes, all of which lack true eyelids, consists of a seemingly listless state in which the fish maintains its balance but moves slowly. If attacked or disturbed, most can dart away. A few kinds of fishes lie on the bottom to sleep. Most catfishes, some loaches, and some eels and electric fishes are strictly nocturnal, being active and hunting for food during the night and retiring during the day to holes, thick vegetation, or other protective parts of the environment.
Communication between members of a species or between members of two or more species often is extremely important, especially in breeding behaviour (see below Reproduction). The mode of communication may be visual, as between the small so-called cleaner fish and a large fish of a very different species. The larger fish often allows the cleaner to enter its mouth to remove gill parasites. The cleaner is recognized by its distinctive colour and actions and therefore is not eaten, even if the larger fish is normally a predator. Communication is often chemical, signals being sent by specific chemicals called pheromones.
Many fishes have a streamlined body and swim freely in open water. Fish locomotion is closely correlated with habitat and ecological niche (the general position of the animal to its environment).
Many fishes in both marine and fresh waters swim at the surface and have mouths adapted to feed best (and sometimes only) at the surface. Often such fishes are long and slender, able to dart at surface insects or at other surface fishes and in turn to dart away from predators; needlefishes, halfbeaks, and topminnows (such as killifish and mosquito fish) are good examples. Oceanic flying fishes escape their predators by gathering speed above the water surface, with the lower lobe of the tail providing thrust in the water. They then glide hundreds of yards on enlarged, winglike pectoral and pelvic fins. South American freshwater flying fishes escape their enemies by jumping and propelling their strongly keeled bodies out of the water.
So-called mid-water swimmers, the most common type of fish, are of many kinds and live in many habitats. The powerful fusiform tunas and the trouts, for example, are adapted for strong, fast swimming, the tunas to capture prey speedily in the open ocean and the trouts to cope with the swift currents of streams and rivers. The trout body form is well adapted to many habitats. Fishes that live in relatively quiet waters such as bays or lake shores or slow rivers usually are not strong, fast swimmers but are capable of short, quick bursts of speed to escape a predator. Many of these fishes have their sides flattened, examples being the sunfish and the freshwater angelfish of aquarists. Fish associated with the bottom or substrate usually are slow swimmers. Open-water plankton-feeding fishes almost always remain fusiform and are capable of rapid, strong movement (for example, sardines and herrings of the open ocean and also many small minnows of streams and lakes).
Bottom-living fishes are of many kinds and have undergone many types of modification of their body shape and swimming habits. Rays, which evolved from strong-swimming mid-water sharks, usually stay close to the bottom and move by undulating their large pectoral fins. Flounders live in a similar habitat and move over the bottom by undulating the entire body. Many bottom fishes dart from place to place, resting on the bottom between movements, a motion common in gobies. One goby relative, the mudskipper, has taken to living at the edge of pools along the shore of muddy mangrove swamps. It escapes its enemies by flipping rapidly over the mud, out of the water. Some catfishes, synbranchid eels, the so-called climbing perch, and a few other fishes venture out over damp ground to find more promising waters than those that they left. They move by wriggling their bodies, sometimes using strong pectoral fins; most have accessory air-breathing organs. Many bottom-dwelling fishes live in mud holes or rocky crevices. Marine eels and gobies commonly are found in such habitats and for the most part venture far beyond their cavelike homes. Some bottom dwellers, such as the clingfishes (Gobiesocidae), have developed powerful adhesive disks that enable them to remain in place on the substrate in areas such as rocky coasts, where the action of the waves is great.
The methods of reproduction in fishes are varied, but most fishes lay a large number of small eggs, fertilized and scattered outside of the body. The eggs of pelagic fishes usually remain suspended in the open water. Many shore and freshwater fishes lay eggs on the bottom or among plants. Some have adhesive eggs. The mortality of the young and especially of the eggs is very high, and often only a few individuals grow to maturity out of hundreds, thousands, and in some cases millions of eggs laid.
Males produce sperm, usually as a milky white substance called milt, in two (sometimes one) testes within the body cavity. In bony fishes a sperm duct leads from each testis to a urogenital opening behind the vent or anus. In sharks and rays and in cyclostomes the duct leads to a cloaca. Sometimes the pelvic fins are modified to help transmit the milt to the eggs at the female’s vent or on the substrate where the female has placed them. Sometimes accessory organs are used to fertilize females internally—for example, the claspers of many sharks and rays.
In the females the eggs are formed in two ovaries (sometimes only one) and pass through the ovaries to the urogenital opening and to the outside. In some fishes the eggs are fertilized internally but are shed before development takes place. Members of about a dozen families each of bony fishes (teleosts) and sharks bear live young. Many skates and rays also bear live young. In some bony fishes the eggs simply develop within the female, the young emerging when the eggs hatch (ovoviviparous). Others develop within the ovary and are nourished by ovarian tissues after hatching (viviparous). There are also other methods utilized by fishes to nourish young within the female. In all live-bearers the young are born at a relatively large size and are few in number. In one family of primarily marine fishes, the surfperches from the Pacific coast of North America, Japan, and Korea, the males of at least one species are born sexually mature, although they are not fully grown.
Some fishes are hermaphroditic—an individual producing both sperm and eggs, usually at different stages of its life. Self-fertilization, however, is probably rare.
Successful reproduction and, in many cases, defense of the eggs and the young are assured by rather stereotypical but often elaborate courtship and parental behaviour, either by the male or the female or both. Some fishes prepare nests by hollowing out depressions in the sand bottom (cichlids, for example), build nests with plant materials and sticky threads excreted by the kidneys (sticklebacks), or blow a cluster of mucus-covered bubbles at the water surface (gouramis). The eggs are laid in these structures. Some varieties of cichlids and catfishes incubate eggs in their mouths.
Some fishes, such as salmon, undergo long migrations from the ocean and up large rivers to spawn in the gravel beds where they themselves hatched (anadromous fishes). Some, such as the freshwater eels (family Anguillidae), live and grow to maturity in fresh water and migrate to the sea to spawn (catadromous fishes). Other fishes undertake shorter migrations from lakes into streams, within the ocean, or enter spawning habitats that they do not ordinarily occupy in other ways.
The basic structure and function of the fish body are similar to those of all other vertebrates. The usual four types of tissues are present: surface or epithelial, connective (bone, cartilage, and fibrous tissues, as well as their derivative, blood), nerve, and muscle tissues. In addition, the fish’s organs and organ systems parallel those of other vertebrates.
The typical fish body is streamlined and spindle-shaped, with an anterior head, a gill apparatus, and a heart, the latter lying in the midline just below the gill chamber. The body cavity, containing the vital organs, is situated behind the head in the lower anterior part of the body. The anus usually marks the posterior termination of the body cavity and most often occurs just in front of the base of the anal fin. The spinal cord and vertebral column continue from the posterior part of the head to the base of the tail fin, passing dorsal to the body cavity and through the caudal (tail) region behind the body cavity. Most of the body is of muscular tissue, a high proportion of which is necessitated by swimming. In the course of evolution this basic body plan has been modified repeatedly into the many varieties of fish shapes that exist today.
The skeleton forms an integral part of the fish’s locomotion system, as well as serving to protect vital parts. The internal skeleton consists of the skull bones (except for the roofing bones of the head, which are really part of the external skeleton), the vertebral column, and the fin supports (fin rays). The fin supports are derived from the external skeleton but will be treated here because of their close functional relationship to the internal skeleton. The internal skeleton of cyclostomes, sharks, and rays is of cartilage; that of many fossil groups and some primitive living fishes is mostly of cartilage but may include some bone. In place of the vertebral column, the earliest vertebrates had a fully developed notochord, a flexible stiff rod of viscous cells surrounded by a strong fibrous sheath. During the evolution of modern fishes the rod was replaced in part by cartilage and then by ossified cartilage. Sharks and rays retain a cartilaginous vertebral column; bony fishes have spool-shaped vertebrae that in the more primitive living forms only partially replace the notochord. The skull, including the gill arches and jaws of bony fishes, is fully, or at least partially, ossified. That of sharks and rays remains cartilaginous, at times partially replaced by calcium deposits but never by true bone.
The supportive elements of the fins (basal or radial bones or both) have changed greatly during fish evolution. Some of these changes are described in the section below (Evolution and paleontology). Most fishes possess a single dorsal fin on the midline of the back. Many have two and a few have three dorsal fins. The other fins are the single tail and anal fins and paired pelvic and pectoral fins. A small fin, the adipose fin, with hairlike fin rays, occurs in many of the relatively primitive teleosts (such as trout) on the back near the base of the caudal fin.
The skin of a fish must serve many functions. It aids in maintaining the osmotic balance, provides physical protection for the body, is the site of coloration, contains sensory receptors, and, in some fishes, functions in respiration. Mucous glands, which aid in maintaining the water balance and offer protection from bacteria, are extremely numerous in fish skin, especially in cyclostomes and teleosts. Since mucous glands are present in the modern lampreys, it is reasonable to assume that they were present in primitive fishes, such as the ancient Silurian and Devonian agnathans. Protection from abrasion and predation is another function of the fish skin, and dermal (skin) bone arose early in fish evolution in response to this need. It is thought that bone first evolved in skin and only later invaded the cartilaginous areas of the fish’s body, to provide additional support and protection. There is some argument as to which came first, cartilage or bone, and fossil evidence does not settle the question. In any event, dermal bone has played an important part in fish evolution and has different characteristics in different groups of fishes. Several groups are characterized at least in part by the kind of bony scales they possess.
Scales have played an important part in the evolution of fishes. Primitive fishes usually had thick bony plates or thick scales in several layers of bone, enamel, and related substances. Modern teleost fishes have scales of bone, which, while still protective, allow much more freedom of motion in the body. A few modern teleosts (some catfishes, sticklebacks, and others) have secondarily acquired bony plates in the skin. Modern and early sharks possessed placoid scales, a relatively primitive type of scale with a toothlike structure, consisting of an outside layer of enamel-like substance (vitrodentine), an inner layer of dentine, and a pulp cavity containing nerves and blood vessels. Primitive bony fishes had thick scales of either the ganoid or the cosmoid type. Cosmoid scales have a hard, enamel-like outer layer, an inner layer of cosmine (a form of dentine), and then a layer of vascular bone (isopedine). In ganoid scales the hard outer layer is different chemically and is called ganoin. Under this is a cosminelike layer and then a vascular bony layer. The thin, translucent bony scales of modern fishes, called cycloid and ctenoid (the latter distinguished by serrations at the edges), lack enameloid and dentine layers.
Skin has several other functions in fishes. It is well supplied with nerve endings and presumably receives tactile, thermal, and pain stimuli. Skin is also well supplied with blood vessels. Some fishes breathe in part through the skin, by the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide between the surrounding water and numerous small blood vessels near the skin surface.
Skin serves as protection through the control of coloration. Fishes exhibit an almost limitless range of colours. The colours often blend closely with the surroundings, effectively hiding the animal. Many fishes use bright colours for territorial advertisement or as recognition marks for other members of their own species, or sometimes for members of other species. Many fishes can change their colour to a greater or lesser degree, by movement of pigment within the pigment cells (chromatophores). Black pigment cells (melanophores), of almost universal occurrence in fishes, are often juxtaposed with other pigment cells. When placed beneath iridocytes or leucophores (bearing the silvery or white pigment guanine), melanophores produce structural colours of blue and green. These colours are often extremely intense, because they are formed by refraction of light through the needlelike crystals of guanine. The blue and green refracted colours are often relatively pure, lacking the red and yellow rays, which have been absorbed by the black pigment (melanin) of the melanophores. Yellow, orange, and red colours are produced by erythrophores, cells containing the appropriate carotenoid pigments. Other colours are produced by combinations of melanophores, erythrophores, and iridocytes.
The major portion of the body of most fishes consists of muscles. Most of the mass is trunk musculature, the fin muscles usually being relatively small. The caudal fin is usually the most powerful fin, being moved by the trunk musculature. The body musculature is usually arranged in rows of chevron-shaped segments on each side. Contractions of these segments, each attached to adjacent vertebrae and vertebral processes, bends the body on the vertebral joint, producing successive undulations of the body, passing from the head to the tail, and producing driving strokes of the tail. It is the latter that provides the strong forward movement for most fishes.
The digestive system, in a functional sense, starts at the mouth, with the teeth used to capture prey or collect plant foods. Mouth shape and tooth structure vary greatly in fishes, depending on the kind of food normally eaten. Most fishes are predacious, feeding on small invertebrates or other fishes and have simple conical teeth on the jaws, on at least some of the bones of the roof of the mouth, and on special gill arch structures just in front of the esophagus. The latter are throat teeth. Most predacious fishes swallow their prey whole, and the teeth are used for grasping and holding prey, for orienting prey to be swallowed (head first) and for working the prey toward the esophagus. There are a variety of tooth types in fishes. Some fishes, such as sharks and piranhas, have cutting teeth for biting chunks out of their victims. A shark’s tooth, although superficially like that of a piranha, appears in many respects to be a modified scale, while that of the piranha is like that of other bony fishes, consisting of dentine and enamel. Parrot fishes have beaklike mouths with short incisor-like teeth for breaking off coral and have heavy pavementlike throat teeth for crushing the coral. Some catfishes have small brushlike teeth, arranged in rows on the jaws, for scraping plant and animal growth from rocks. Many fishes (such as the Cyprinidae or minnows) have no jaw teeth at all but have very strong throat teeth.
Some fishes gather planktonic food by straining it from their gill cavities with numerous elongate stiff rods (gill rakers) anchored by one end to the gill bars. The food collected on these rods is passed to the throat, where it is swallowed. Most fishes have only short gill rakers that help keep food particles from escaping out the mouth cavity into the gill chamber.
Once reaching the throat, food enters a short, often greatly distensible esophagus, a simple tube with a muscular wall leading into a stomach. The stomach varies greatly in fishes, depending upon the diet. In most predacious fishes it is a simple straight or curved tube or pouch with a muscular wall and a glandular lining. Food is largely digested there and leaves the stomach in liquid form.
Between the stomach and the intestine, ducts enter the digestive tube from the liver and pancreas. The liver is a large, clearly defined organ. The pancreas may be embedded in it, diffused through it, or broken into small parts spread along some of the intestine. The junction between the stomach and the intestine is marked by a muscular valve. Pyloric ceca (blind sacs) occur in some fishes at this junction and have a digestive or absorptive function or both.
The intestine itself is quite variable in length, depending upon the fish’s diet. It is short in predacious forms, sometimes no longer than the body cavity, but long in herbivorous forms, being coiled and several times longer than the entire length of the fish in some species of South American catfishes. The intestine is primarily an organ for absorbing nutrients into the bloodstream. The larger its internal surface, the greater its absorptive efficiency, and a spiral valve is one method of increasing its absorption surface.
Sharks, rays, chimaeras, lungfishes, surviving chondrosteans, holosteans, and even a few of the more primitive teleosts have a spiral valve or at least traces of it in the intestine. Most modern teleosts have increased the area of the intestinal walls by having numerous folds and villi (fingerlike projections) somewhat like those in humans. Undigested substances are passed to the exterior through the anus in most teleost fishes. In lungfishes, sharks, and rays, it is first passed through the cloaca, a common cavity receiving the intestinal opening and the ducts from the urogenital system.
Oxygen and carbon dioxide dissolve in water, and most fishes exchange dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide in water by means of the gills. The gills lie behind and to the side of the mouth cavity and consist of fleshy filaments supported by the gill arches and filled with blood vessels, which give gills a bright red colour. Water taken in continuously through the mouth passes backward between the gill bars and over the gill filaments, where the exchange of gases takes place. The gills are protected by a gill cover in teleosts and many other fishes but by flaps of skin in sharks, rays, and some of the older fossil fish groups. The blood capillaries in the gill filaments are close to the gill surface to take up oxygen from the water and to give up excess carbon dioxide to the water.
Most modern fishes have a hydrostatic (ballast) organ, called the swim bladder, that lies in the body cavity just below the kidney and above the stomach and intestine. It originated as a diverticulum of the digestive canal. In advanced teleosts, especially the acanthopterygians, the bladder has lost its connection with the digestive tract, a condition called physoclistic. The connection has been retained (physostomous) by many relatively primitive teleosts. In several unrelated lines of fishes, the bladder has become specialized as a lung or, at least, as a highly vascularized accessory breathing organ. Some fishes with such accessory organs are obligate air breathers and will drown if denied access to the surface, even in well-oxygenated water. Fishes with a hydrostatic form of swim bladder can control their depth by regulating the amount of gas in the bladder. The gas, mostly oxygen, is secreted into the bladder by special glands, rendering the fish more buoyant; the gas is absorbed into the bloodstream by another special organ, reducing the overall buoyancy and allowing the fish to sink. Some deep-sea fishes may have oils, rather than gas, in the bladder. Other deep-sea and some bottom-living forms have much-reduced swim bladders or have lost the organ entirely.
The swim bladder of fishes follows the same developmental pattern as the lungs of land vertebrates. There is no doubt that the two structures have the same historical origin in primitive fishes. More or less intermediate forms still survive among the more primitive types of fishes, such as the lungfishes Lepidosiren and Protopterus.
The circulatory, or blood vascular, system consists of the heart, the arteries, the capillaries, and the veins. It is in the capillaries that the interchange of oxygen, carbon dioxide, nutrients, and other substances such as hormones and waste products takes place. The capillaries lead to the veins, which return the venous blood with its waste products to the heart, kidneys, and gills. There are two kinds of capillary beds: those in the gills and those in the rest of the body. The heart, a folded continuous muscular tube with three or four saclike enlargements, undergoes rhythmic contractions and receives venous blood in a sinus venosus. It passes the blood to an auricle and then into a thick muscular pump, the ventricle. From the ventricle the blood goes to a bulbous structure at the base of a ventral aorta just below the gills. The blood passes to the afferent (receiving) arteries of the gill arches and then to the gill capillaries. There waste gases are given off to the environment, and oxygen is absorbed. The oxygenated blood enters efferent (exuant) arteries of the gill arches and then flows into the dorsal aorta. From there blood is distributed to the tissues and organs of the body. One-way valves prevent backflow. The circulation of fishes thus differs from that of the reptiles, birds, and mammals in that oxygenated blood is not returned to the heart prior to distribution to the other parts of the body.
The primary excretory organ in fishes, as in other vertebrates, is the kidney. In fishes some excretion also takes place in the digestive tract, skin, and especially the gills (where ammonia is given off). Compared with land vertebrates, fishes have a special problem in maintaining their internal environment at a constant concentration of water and dissolved substances, such as salts. Proper balance of the internal environment (homeostasis) of a fish is in a great part maintained by the excretory system, especially the kidney.
The kidney, gills, and skin play an important role in maintaining a fish’s internal environment and checking the effects of osmosis. Marine fishes live in an environment in which the water around them has a greater concentration of salts than they can have inside their body and still maintain life. Freshwater fishes, on the other hand, live in water with a much lower concentration of salts than they require inside their bodies. Osmosis tends to promote the loss of water from the body of a marine fish and absorption of water by that of a freshwater fish. Mucus in the skin tends to slow the process but is not a sufficient barrier to prevent the movement of fluids through the permeable skin. When solutions on two sides of a permeable membrane have different concentrations of dissolved substances, water will pass through the membrane into the more concentrated solution, while the dissolved chemicals move into the area of lower concentration (diffusion).
The kidney of freshwater fishes is often larger in relation to body weight than that of marine fishes. In both groups the kidney excretes wastes from the body, but the kidney of freshwater fishes also excretes large amounts of water, counteracting the water absorbed through the skin. Freshwater fishes tend to lose salt to the environment and must replace it. They get some salt from their food, but the gills and skin inside the mouth actively absorb salt from water passed through the mouth. This absorption is performed by special cells capable of moving salts against the diffusion gradient. Freshwater fishes drink very little water and take in little water with their food.
Marine fishes must conserve water, and therefore their kidneys excrete little water. To maintain their water balance, marine fishes drink large quantities of seawater, retaining most of the water and excreting the salt. Most nitrogenous waste in marine fishes appears to be secreted by the gills as ammonia. Marine fishes can excrete salt by clusters of special cells (chloride cells) in the gills.
There are several teleosts—for example, the salmon—that travel between fresh water and seawater and must adjust to the reversal of osmotic gradients. They adjust their physiological processes by spending time (often surprisingly little time) in the intermediate brackish environment.
Marine hagfishes, sharks, and rays have osmotic concentrations in their blood about equal to that of seawater and so do not have to drink water nor perform much physiological work to maintain their osmotic balance. In sharks and rays the osmotic concentration is kept high by retention of urea in the blood. Freshwater sharks have a lowered concentration of urea in the blood.
Endocrine glands secrete their products into the bloodstream and body tissues and, along with the central nervous system, control and regulate many kinds of body functions. Cyclostomes have a well-developed endocrine system, and presumably it was well developed in the early Agnatha, ancestral to modern fishes. Although the endocrine system in fishes is similar to that of higher vertebrates, there are numerous differences in detail. The pituitary, the thyroid, the suprarenals, the adrenals, the pancreatic islets, the sex glands (ovaries and testes), the inner wall of the intestine, and the bodies of the ultimobranchial gland make up the endocrine system in fishes. There are some others whose function is not well understood. These organs regulate sexual activity and reproduction, growth, osmotic pressure, general metabolic activities such as the storage of fat and the utilization of foodstuffs, blood pressure, and certain aspects of skin colour. Many of these activities are also controlled in part by the central nervous system, which works with the endocrine system in maintaining the life of a fish. Some parts of the endocrine system are developmentally, and undoubtedly evolutionarily, derived from the nervous system.
As in all vertebrates, the nervous system of fishes is the primary mechanism coordinating body activities, as well as integrating these activities in the appropriate manner with stimuli from the environment. The central nervous system, consisting of the brain and spinal cord, is the primary integrating mechanism. The peripheral nervous system, consisting of nerves that connect the brain and spinal cord to various body organs, carries sensory information from special receptor organs such as the eyes, internal ears, nares (sense of smell), taste glands, and others to the integrating centres of the brain and spinal cord. The peripheral nervous system also carries information via different nerve cells from the integrating centres of the brain and spinal cord. This coded information is carried to the various organs and body systems, such as the skeletal muscular system, for appropriate action in response to the original external or internal stimulus. Another branch of the nervous system, the autonomic nervous system, helps to coordinate the activities of many glands and organs and is itself closely connected to the integrating centres of the brain.
The brain of the fish is divided into several anatomical and functional parts, all closely interconnected but each serving as the primary centre of integrating particular kinds of responses and activities. Several of these centres or parts are primarily associated with one type of sensory perception, such as sight, hearing, or smell (olfaction).
The sense of smell is important in almost all fishes. Certain eels with tiny eyes depend mostly on smell for location of food. The olfactory, or nasal, organ of fishes is located on the dorsal surface of the snout. The lining of the nasal organ has special sensory cells that perceive chemicals dissolved in the water, such as substances from food material, and send sensory information to the brain by way of the first cranial nerve. Odour also serves as an alarm system. Many fishes, especially various species of freshwater minnows, react with alarm to a chemical released from the skin of an injured member of their own species.
Many fishes have a well-developed sense of taste, and tiny pitlike taste buds or organs are located not only within their mouth cavities but also over their heads and parts of their body. Catfishes, which often have poor vision, have barbels (“whiskers”) that serve as supplementary taste organs, those around the mouth being actively used to search out food on the bottom. Some species of naturally blind cave fishes are especially well supplied with taste buds, which often cover most of their body surface.
Sight is extremely important in most fishes. The eye of a fish is basically like that of all other vertebrates, but the eyes of fishes are extremely varied in structure and adaptation. In general, fishes living in dark and dim water habitats have large eyes, unless they have specialized in some compensatory way so that another sense (such as smell) is dominant, in which case the eyes will often be reduced. Fishes living in brightly lighted shallow waters often will have relatively small but efficient eyes. Cyclostomes have somewhat less elaborate eyes than other fishes, with skin stretched over the eyeball perhaps making their vision somewhat less effective. Most fishes have a spherical lens and accommodate their vision to far or near subjects by moving the lens within the eyeball. A few sharks accommodate by changing the shape of the lens, as in land vertebrates. Those fishes that are heavily dependent upon the eyes have especially strong muscles for accommodation. Most fishes see well, despite the restrictions imposed by frequent turbidity of the water and by light refraction.
Fossil evidence suggests that colour vision evolved in fishes more than 300 million years ago, but not all living fishes have retained this ability. Experimental evidence indicates that many shallow-water fishes, if not all, have colour vision and see some colours especially well, but some bottom-dwelling shore fishes live in areas where the water is sufficiently deep to filter out most if not all colours, and these fishes apparently never see colours. When tested in shallow water, they apparently are unable to respond to colour differences.
Sound perception and balance are intimately associated senses in a fish. The organs of hearing are entirely internal, located within the skull, on each side of the brain and somewhat behind the eyes. Sound waves, especially those of low frequencies, travel readily through water and impinge directly upon the bones and fluids of the head and body, to be transmitted to the hearing organs. Fishes readily respond to sound; for example, a trout conditioned to escape by the approach of fishermen will take flight upon perceiving footsteps on a stream bank even if it cannot see a fisherman. Compared with humans, however, the range of sound frequencies heard by fishes is greatly restricted. Many fishes communicate with each other by producing sounds in their swim bladders, in their throats by rasping their teeth, and in other ways.
A fish or other vertebrate seldom has to rely on a single type of sensory information to determine the nature of the environment around it. A catfish uses taste and touch when examining a food object with its oral barbels. Like most other animals, fishes have many touch receptors over their body surface. Pain and temperature receptors also are present in fishes and presumably produce the same kind of information to a fish as to humans. Fishes react in a negative fashion to stimuli that would be painful to human beings, suggesting that they feel a sensation of pain.
An important sensory system in fishes that is absent in other vertebrates (except some amphibians) is the lateral line system. This consists of a series of heavily innervated small canals located in the skin and bone around the eyes, along the lower jaw, over the head, and down the mid-side of the body, where it is associated with the scales. Intermittently along these canals are located tiny sensory organs (pit organs) that apparently detect changes in pressure. The system allows a fish to sense changes in water currents and pressure, thereby helping the fish to orient itself to the various changes that occur in the physical environment.
Light over Sea and Land – The Önningeby Colony on Åland
waldemarsudde.se/en/exhibitions/light-over-sea-and-land-t...
Joining the year-long centenary celebration of the autonomy of the Åland Islands, Waldemarsudde will host the first ever Swedish exhibition featuring the nineteenth century artist’s colony at Önningeby on Åland, a highly interesting but often overlooked group. Active from 1886 until 1914, the colony was made up of mostly Swedish, Finnish and Estonian artists. This exhibition highlights many of the Swedish and Finlandic Önningeby painters’ most important works depicting the island’s rural landscape and the Åland archipelago, along with portraits of their artist friends and photographs from life in the community.
The artists represented here include J.A.G. Acke, Ida Gisiko-Spärck, Anna Wengberg and Edvard Westman from Sweden, and Victor Westerholm, Elin Danielson-Gambogi, Hanna Rönnberg, Ellen Favorin, Amélie Lundahl, Eva Acke, Elias Muukka and Helmi Sjöstrand from Finland.
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”Second to the arts, I think flowers are my greatest joy,” Prince Eugen wrote in a letter in 1901.
A visit to the beautiful park and garden at Waldemarsudde is a treat for many senses and offers more than a century old garden history. The design of the garden determined by Prince Eugen, is still managed according to the Prince’s instructions and directions. The park is also rich in sculptures, all of them bought by Prince Eugen, often with specific sites in mind.
Prince Eugen was an art collector of note, with special emphasis on Nordic and French art. The Collections number around 7,000 works and comprise painting, sculpture and crafts objects. The Painting Collection includes works by Ernst Josephson, Anders Zorn, Julia Beck, Isaac Grünewald, Sigrid Hjertén and Sven X:et Erixson. International artists such as Edvard Munch and Auguste Rodin are also represented. Throughout the year, a selection of Prince Eugen’s own art and works from the Collections, are on display.
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Prince Eugen's Waldemarsudde (Swedish for Cape Waldemar), is a museum located on Djurgården in central Stockholm. The name is composed of Waldemar, an Old German noble male name, and udde, meaning cape. It is derived from a historical name of the island Djurgården, Valmundsö.
It was the former home of the Swedish Prince Eugen, who discovered the place in 1892, when he rented a house there for a few days. Seven years later he bought the premises and had a new house designed by the architect Ferdinand Boberg, who also designed Rosenbad (the Prime Minister's Office and the Government Chancellery), and erected 1903–1904.
Prince Eugen had been educated as a painter in Paris and after his death the house was converted to a museum of his own and others paintings. The prince died in 1947 and is buried by the beach close to the house.
The complex consists of a castle-like main building—the Mansion—completed in 1905, and the Gallery Building, added in 1913. The estate also includes the original manor-house building, known as the Old House and an old linseed mill, both dating back to the 1780s. The estate is set in parkland which features centuries-old oak trees and reflects the prince's interest for gardening and flower arrangement. The Art Nouveau interior, including the cocklestoves, by Boberg are designed in a Gustavian style and makes good use of both the panoramic view of the inlet to Stockholm and the light resulting from the elevated location of the building.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldemarsudde
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