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From: dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Risky Rat)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Re: Salt Water Taffy
Message-ID: <1384@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 9-Aug-85 08:34:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.1384
Posted: Fri Aug  9 08:34:04 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 12-Aug-85 04:31:56 EDT
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>> [Paul DuBois]
>> J Chervinski, "Salinity tolerance of the guppy, _Poecilia reticulata_
>> Peters", J Fish Biology, 24(4), April 1984, 449-452.

>> ... table and abstract deleted...

>> The practical significance of this work is that brackish water and salt
>> marshes are favorable mosquito breeding habitats.  Stocking of guppies,
>> which feed on the mosquito larvae, is thus a pest control measure.

>> The significance may also extend to some of the discussion in this
>> newsgroup...I thought that perhaps some of the readers might be
>> interested.

> [Michael Lonetto]
> Very interesting.  What does it have to do with evolution?  The guppies
> don't "evolve" in 168 hours.  They already have the ability to live in
> salt water.  Swamp fish tend to be very adaptable with regard to water
> quality.  Is that the evolution you refer to?  Please be more specific.

It doesn't have anything to do with evolution.  I wasn't referring
to anything about evolution.

(pre-reply comment:  Golly!  Often we see the statement that "all
'pro-creation' writings of creationists are simply anti-evolution
statements."  I guess one unfortunate manifestation of this expectation
is that when something not anti-evolution appears, it becomes
incomprehensible?)

Andrew Koenig asked, long ago, about the consequences, with regard to
fish mortality, of a flood.  The question was motivated, I believe,
by the expectation that the difference in habitat of fresh- and
salt-water fish would would cause the death of all the members of one
or both groups.  I mentioned, in response to the original question,
the existence of salmon, and also a quotation from _The Origin_:

  "[S]alt-water fish can with care be slowly accustomed to live in
  fresh water; and, according to Valenciennes, there is hardly a single
  group of fishes confined exclusively to fresh water, so that we may
  imagine that a marine member of a fresh-water group might travel far
  along the shores of the sea, and subsequently become modified and
  adapted to the fresh waters of a distant land."

The article by Chervinski also has a bearing on this issue, and when I
ran across it recently, I thought that it might be worthwhile
posting.  It doesn't *prove* a flood of course, nor was that my
intent.  It shows that in such an eventuality, not all fresh-water
fish would die.  (It does not show that all fresh-water fish would
live.)

-- 
                                                                    |
Paul DuBois     {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois        --+--
                                                                    |
Ritual and Ceremony:  Life Itself.                                  |