Fish in the News. Each week the Bailey Brothers start the Pet Fish Talk Show with some fun and interesting stories about fish in the news.       Near Sparks, Nevada, Pet Smart Opens New Facility with 4500 Tanks. The only thing missing now is the fish. But that will change next month, when PetSmart Inc. begins stocking 4,500 holding tanks with what will eventually be up to 500,000 tropical and other types of fish in its mammoth distribution center 15 miles east of Sparks, Nevada. Fish are an integral part of the product line for the pet supplies and services retailer, and the 870,000-square-foot facility in the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center has a room dedicated to holding them before they are shipped, posthaste, to hundreds of PetSmart stores across the West. Click here to read more.       In Gibsonton, Florida, Many Tropical Fish Freeze on Florida Fish Farms. "It was the worst weather event that the tropical fish industry's had in a while," said Tim Hennessy, president of EkkWill Waterlife Resources in Gibsonton, Florida. "But it took some time afterwards for people to really realize the impact of it." Days after temperatures dropped, dead fish started floating to the surface and birds began to feast. "Sometimes you don't know until you clean the pond and find there's nothing there," said Art Rawlins, the president of the Florida Tropical Fish Farms Association. On his 27-acre farm in Lithia, Rawlins estimates hundreds of thousands of fish died in the freeze. That's about $200,000 and 60 percent of his inventory. To protect from freezes some fish farmers put plastic covers over their ponds, like the one shown above. Click here to read more.       In Fox Lake, Illinois, A 3,800 Gallon Saltwater Aquarium with a Shark. If you owned a pet store and had all kinds of dogs, parrots and fish at your fingertips every day, what kind of pet would you have at home? Sharks. Blacktip reef sharks to be exact.  Ron Dooley, president of the Somethin' Fishy pet store in Fox Lake, has a 3,800-gallon saltwater fish tank at his home in the Lake in the Hills area. His store also has a 2,000-gallon pond with two lemon sharks. By shark standards, they're small, only two to three feet long. But they've still got the jaws. On Saturdays around 2 p.m. he feeds the $1,500 sharks in front of store customers. They eat about five pounds of tilapia fillets, squid and shrimp every weekend. There's also a 3-foot-long green moray eel in the tank. Dooley, a longtime scuba enthusiast and aquarium hobbyist, got his first shark when his store opened in the Town Center strip in Fox Lake in 2001. He got his second shark in 2004, and only recently installed a shark tank in his home. Click here to read more.       At the University of California, Santa Barbara, Mysterious Squid Beak Is Both Hard And Soft. How did nature make the squid's beak super hard and sharp - allowing it, without harm to its soft body - to capture its prey? The question has captivated those interested in creating new materials that mimic biological materials. The results are published in the journal Science. The sharp beak of the Humboldt squid, shown above, is one of the hardest and stiffest organic materials known. Engineers, biologists, and marine scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara, have joined forces to discover how the soft, gelatinous squid can operate its knife-like beak without tearing itself to pieces. Click here to read more.         From James Cook University in Australia Coral And Algae Threatened By Global Warming. Over two hundred million humans depend for their subsistence on the fact that coral has an addiction to ‘junk food’ - and orders its partners, the symbiotic algae, to make it. This curious arrangement is one of Nature’s most delicate and complex partnerships – a collaboration now facing grave threats from climate change. The symbiosis between coral – a primitive animal – and zooxanthellae, tiny one-celled plants, is not only powerful enough to build the largest living organism on the planet, the Great Barrier Reef, but also underpins the economies and living standards of many tropical nations and societies who harvest their food from the reefs, shown above, or have developing tourism industries. Click here to read more.       New Discoveries about the Sea Cucumber. Recently, scientists have found in the humble sea cuke an unlikely muse for some exciting new medical technologies. One such development is a new plastic that mimics a sea cucumber's ability to quickly change the rigidity of its skin as a defense mechanism. When dry, the new plastic is hard and stiff; when wet, it softens and becomes flexible, and it's capable of switching quickly back and forth between the two states. Inspired by the makeup of sea-cucumber skin, the material is composed of a rubber-like base supported by fibers of cellulose attached to one another by hydrogen bonds, creating a rigid surface when dry. When water is introduced to the system, the hydrogen bonds are broken and the support structure comes loose, making the material pliable. When the material dries out again, the hydrogen bonds among the collagen fibers quickly regenerate, and rigidity is restored. One of the potential uses for this new plastic is incorporating it into brain implants that could be used to treat Parkinson's disease or even spinal injuries. Another recent study shows that a gene in the sea cucumber blocks transmission of the parasite that causes malaria. Click here to read more.     In Oklahoma City Quality Pets Damaged by a Four-Alarm Fire. Reptiles, birds and other small animals were inside an Oklahoma City pet store that went up in flames on Friday, authorities confirm. Fire crews battled a four-alarm blaze at Quality Pets, located at 1501 Agnew Ave., in Oklahoma City, for about an hour before getting the blaze under control. It was a three-alarm fire elevated to four alarms so that extra crews could help with pet removal, authorities said. Click here to read more.     In Venice, Italy, Flood Barrier Blossoms into a Coral Reef. A coral reef has bloomed in the Adriatic Sea on the site where a tidal barrier is being constructed to protect Venice. Marine biologists said the Mose project - a Thames Barrier-style defense around the Venetian lagoon - has proven an irresistible magnet to rare coral, fish and crustaceans. They have discovered more than 150 different species, including the giant pen shell (Pinna Nobilis), an endangered bivalve that can grow up to 3ft long and is normally found in the warmer waters around Sardinia. Click here to read more.     Joshua from Okemos, Michigan, says ... Hey Guys Here are a few interesting things I have found ... Hope you enjoy ... Joshua From Okemos MI   http://www.mlive.com/environment/..._dow_chemic.html   http://www.hollandsentinel.com/.../local_20080317013.shtml   http://www.mlive.com/newsflash/...storylist=newsmichigan   http://www.indystar.com/.../LOCAL17   http://www.sciencedaily.com/...0326111641.htm   http://www.hollandsentinel.com/...20080324011.shtml   http://www.freep.com/...NEWS06/803220373   http://www.mlive.com/...newsmichigan   http://www.hollandsentinel.com/...20080318001.shtml   Callers during this Show Sean from Tennessee calls and talks about his 12-gallon Eclipse Aquarium with Cherry Shrimp, Singapore Shrimp, Marimo Algae Balls, Christmas Moss, and adding Iodine Supplement to help the shrimps molt. Evan from Colorado says he and his family are going to Hawaii next week, and he's got a new underwater case for his camera, so he can take some pictures while snorkeling. 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