Did you know that clownfish talk to each other? Well, perhaps not exactly “talk” like Nemo in the movie, but they make sounds to communicate among themselves, and maybe to other marine life too. This was demonstrated recently by Eric Parmentier at the University of Liege in Belgium, who is a fish-behaviour specialist.

According to his research, published in the journal Science, Eric and his colleagues determined that clownfish use their jaws to make clicking and knocking sounds…essentially snapping their jaws shut, producing a sound similar to the chattering our teeth make when we shiver.

Perhaps clownfish can’t engage in deep discussions about the meaning of life, but it seems that they’re much more talkative than most of us imagined.

Here’s a sample of clownfish chatter:

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 27th, 2007 at 4:17 pm and is filed under Critters, FiNS Fun Facts.