Pets of Interest - Fishy, Fishy

by Carie Stafford My name is Rex. I am a common goldfish, and I live with two comet goldfish. We are all four years old, and we were won at the goldfish game at the Guardian Hose Carnival. Now, as far as carnival fish go, I guess we are not expected to live very long. But our mom put us in a tank together, and the rest is history. She named me Rex, I’m the big one; the other two fancy looking ones, the comet goldfish, are named Bubbles and Goldie. Don’t ask me which one is which, they both look the same to me. There are so many misconceptions around goldfish. We don’t have stomachs, so that is why our tank water gets so dirty so fast. We really should only eat a little bit a couple times a day, or our tank will get very dirty; if it is not cleaned regularly, we can get diseases and die. We can recognize faces, and my memory is about three months long. Yep, I know what my mom looks like, and I get excited when she comes over and talks to me. I can see more colors than a human can; I can see ultraviolet light. We do like light, and we like to sleep in the dark. Our sleeping is more like resting; we are usually less active and seem to be floating in the water. Every now and then, we will flip a fin to keep us settled in the water. We do not have eyelids, so we sleep with our eyes open. We have little pits on our sides that sense movement and water changes; we are always alert. My friends and I love to play tag. We have races to see who can get to the other end of the tank first. We are social creatures and enjoy being together and hanging out. We like to watch what is going on outside our tank—it can be very amusing sometimes. Humans can do some strange things. We are scavengers; when it is feeding time, it is each fish for themselves—friendship goes out the tank. Speaking of feeding time, I see mom getting the fish food…time to eat!