Fish Farts: Herring Use Flatulence To Communicate

Can you imagine if humans used flatulence as a form of communication? Yikes. We don’t want to picture it, either.

But apparently some types of herring do pass gas to “speak” to each other without alerting other fish.

A 2003 study revealed the findings, but we’re just “herring” about it now, and we just had to share.

When the fish pass gas, the bubbles that emanate make a high-frequency sound only audible to herring. The fish use the noise to form “protective shoals” at night to help them stay safe, National Geographic explains.

The men named the phenomenon Fast Repetitive Tick (or, um, FRT). The noise sounds “like someone blowing a high-pitched raspberry,” Robert Batty, senior research scientist at the Scottish Association for Marine Science in Oban, told National Geographic.