hi!!! i found [this phys.org article](https://phys.org/news/2024-06-scientists-puzzle-underwater.html) on my tumblr feed today. it sounds really interesting– from what i could read, it was!!! but a lot of this stuff is going over my head, so i’d appreciate a slightly simpler explanation 😭 please & thank you very much!!!
In: Biology
Even if an animal doesn’t have ears and therefore doesn’t have true hearing, it can still sense vibrations if they are strong enough. If you have ever been to a concert you probably noticed that you don’t need hearing to feel the bass.
All fish can do this, and in addition most fish do have inner ears. And those inner ears work basically the same as ours. They have a spiral cochlea full of little hairs that are excited by vibrations. And when they vibrate nerves pick it up and send that to the brain. Because they do not have an outer ear the only sounds that are carried into the inner ear are those that vibrate the skull sufficiently. But water carries sound well so that is still a pretty good amount of information they are getting.
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