New article published...
- Thread starter emeraldking
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Oh, thank you...
I was watching Wheel of Fortune last night and somebody won a trip to Barbados. I remembered this post and I thought to myself , Hey ! That's an island in the middle of the ocean.
Seems a strange place to find freshwater livebearers. As strange as finding Pachypanchax playfairii in the Seychelles Islands.
Seems a strange place to find freshwater livebearers. As strange as finding Pachypanchax playfairii in the Seychelles Islands.
OP
OP
It's not that strange. There are more livebearers that are to be found at islands. And btw, they weren't found in the ocean but in an inland stream. And yes, livebearers do occur outside the main land as well. And Barbados is one of them, just like Jamaica, Dominican republic and Cuba.
@emeraldking I do know that they were not found in the briny blue surrounding the island. What mystifies me is how freshwater fish leaped that gulf to the freshwater on the island. One source I read speculated on birds as the carriers.
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Well, that's a real good question. Something that we still can not put together. But a birds could be an option. Makes me think of last year when I found a complete unknown fry in one of my outdoor tubs. But we have a park with a pond nearby. I can only imagine that a bird brought an egg (maybe stuck to the beak, legs or feathers) along while it was bathing or drinking at the park's pond and left it unseen in one of my outdoor tubs. For when it grew up, I finally saw what it was and those fish do swim in that pond at the park.
But there are a lot of fish species also introduced by man. Another option is that we do know that a lot of parts of land in the world was once one whole. And parts got separated from eachother. But that's already long, long time ago. Which makes it questionable how long livebearers (or other animals for that matter) actually exist. A question that will probably remain an unsolved topic. I do know quite a lot about livebearers but this is something also I don't know. Maybe it's time to dive in on that subject.
There are so many other islands that have freshwater areas. This could raise the same question...
@emeraldking The scenario you described from your park pond / tub experience is exactly as was described in the article I read about Pachypanchax playfairii arriving from mainland east Africa eastward across the Indian Ocean to the Seychelles Islands. As you say , there is no way to know but it is a fascinating subject. I recently watched a nature program on PBS about seasonal ponds in Africa and they talked about Nothobranchius species of annual Killifish. They speculated that Nothobranchius eggs stick to the mud of elephant feet and get dispersed like that. Fish have launched off into their own space long before mankind got the idea.
OP
OP
It's fascinating indeed... This also brings me back to the evolution of life forms on this earth. How did water creatures got on land and develop legs and wings to become another species adapted by their environment. And how they've spread around the world.
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