In response to Chris Clarke’s Friday extinct herring blogging, I asked:
I’ve heard that modern herring communicate through flatulence. Is this true? If so, I think I’ve found my new totem animal. Listen – I’m communicating right now.
He responded:
It’s true that some herring fart. Here is an impressive and prestigious link as evidence. Whether the farts are a form of communication is still unknown.
I do see some problems inherent in communicative flatulence:
“Who said that?”
“I didn’t say it. He must have said it.”
“No way, man. He who heard it spurred it.”
Etc.
Of course, there are obvious parallels between the use of farts as communication and the dynamics of male blogging practices, the elucidation of which has been left as an exercise for the reader.
The A-list penisphere/herring flatulence link is more adept than you might think. The link Clarke provides gives us greater insight:
Although it was already known that herring could release large clouds of bubbles to confuse predators, releasing small bubbles intermittently when not under threat had not been seen or heard before. “We also noticed that individual fish release more bubbles the more fish are in the tank with them. In other words it seems that herring like to fart in company,” says lead author Ben Wilson.
The noises are only heard at night and may act as a source of communication within the shoal. Batty speculates that fish at the front of a shoal fart to direct other shoal members in a particular direction, keeping the school together at night. During the day these fish use visual information, such as the pattern of light reflected off specialised mirror-like scales, to communicate.
No wonder red herrings are such an effective method of derailing an argument.
Need further proof? Here is the regal sound of a herring. It sounds remarkably like Kevin Drum.