Where Are We Going - Where Have We Been - and How Did We Get Here

The responses of animals to their environment, especially orientational responses, have always attracted our attention. Spectacular migrations of large vertebrates across African plains, Arctic tundra, or seasonal returns of salmon to our rivers have sustained generations of humans by predictable supplies for harvest and invoked series of myths to account for the behavior. Some of the earliest contributions to an understanding of animal orientation and movements came about because people focussed on relatively simple, fixed responses of species such as insects to single cues such as light. Karl von Frisch brought his insight to reveal the dance language of honey bees and establish that species as a rich source for experimental studies. The obvious choice of homing pigeons as a study species for homing behavior opened another wealth of studies and insights.  Fishes, however, presented a difficult combination of complex orientational responses, mostly within an aquatic environment that did not so easily lend itself to careful experimental studies. In this special symposium we will provide some historical review to studies of the orientational responses of a variety of fishes, and details of what we have come to understand of some of the most complex behavioral responses of any animals.