Chemical and visual control of feeding and escape behaviors in the channel catfish Ictalurus punctatus

摘要: Abstract Channel catfish, maintained individually in aquaria with dark substrate, responded to visual stimuli from above escape behavior and amino acid feeding behavior. Feeding was composed of a) appetitive patterns, such as barbel movements, orienting posture, search swimming b) consummatory patterns that included a halt swimming, turning, snapping-biting, ingestion, mastication, swallowing. The conditioning procedure, which consisted 90 s presentations single followed by food reward, influenced the duration speed swim. Swimming quantified counting number turns greater than 90°. Catfish turned 40–75 times conditioned stimuli, l -proline -arginine, but only 20–40 nonconditioned stimuli. Olfaction rather taste involved response because highest possible contact concentration (3 × 10 −6 M ) within stimulus eddies at least 30 lower estimated electrophysiological threshold (>10 −4 ).