Nemo and chips? Tropical fish are fleeing warming waters and heading to the poles

Fish are acutely aware of sea temperature; it’s one of the key reasons particular species of fish live where they do. As the oceans warm however, many tropical species are moving towards cooler climes. So might the traditional cod and chips one day be replaced by Nemo and chips?
It’s a big question, as the distribution of species across the Earth is one of the most fundamental patterns in ecology. All plants and animals are of course adapted to a limited set of climatic and environmental conditions; if the climate changes, we expect distributions to change. This matters not only because we like to eat many of the species in question, but also because entire ecosystems appear to depend on the number of interacting species present.
In general the tropics have more different species than the poles. This pattern, known as the latitudinal diversity gradient, holds true for plants and animals across the world both on land and in the sea. Compare a rainforest or a coral reef with icy tundra or the Arctic ocean.
As ever in the natural sciences, it’s much easier to describe a pattern than to explain its cause but we do know that temperature seems to have a important role, as solar radiation increases levels of primary production. Temperature impacts the food that species can eat and also their metabolic rates and activity levels.
In aquatic systems, temperature also strongly affects the amount of oxygen that can be dissolved in the water. Changes in temperature, therefore, are very likely to lead to changes in the distributions of marine species, and the current trend of warming temperatures is driving fish away from the tropics and towards the poles.

Mapping fishy futures

We need to know what’s lurking round the ecological corner. Miranda Jones and William Cheung of the University of British Columbia have modelled the changes in marine species' ranges – and by summing up, changes in overall biodiversity – expected under the IPCC’s different climate change scenarios. The research, published in the Journal of Marine Science, looks at the known distribution of around 800 marine fish and invertebrate species, matches their distributions with environmental conditions and then projects where these species are likely to be found under future environmental scenarios.
Abandoning the tropics:

Predicted local extinctions 2000-2050. Red = extinction hotspots. Jones & Cheung.

The authors find that tropical seas, particularly the shallow highly diverse seas of South-East Asia are likely to suffer the most local extinctions, while polar – and particularly Arctic – seas are likely to see the greatest number of invasions. Consequently cold regions will generally see biodiversity increases, while tropical regions will suffer.
In total, marine fish and invertebrates are expected to shift 26km per decade towards the poles under the IPCC’s worst case scenario (3°C warming by 2100). Even under the best-case scenario, fish will move 16km per decade.
Similar predictions have been made before and the fishing industry has certainly seen this coming, with infrastructure already being put in place to exploit expected higher catches in Arctic regions. But what is new in this study is an approach combining several different models of species distributions. By looking at agreements between models, the authors identify likely regional hotspots of both extinction and invasion, marked with black diagonal lines in the maps above and below.
Going polar

Where new species will invade, 2000-2050. Red = more invasive species. Jones & Cheung

However, while the idea of tropical fish invading chillier waters might sound fun, we’re unlikely to eat Nemo and chips in London any time soon.
Temperature (or climate) is not the only limit to a species’ distribution; suitable habitat must also exist. Clown fish such as Nemo need to live in a coral reef and such reefs are complex ecological communities themselves with all sorts of environmental requirements.
At the moment ecological and climate models do not allow us to include interactions between species as additional factors that limit movements. This may significantly alter individual species' ranges. Competition from well-established resident fish may discourage new arrivals, for instance, or some fish may rely on a different species specifically to feed their young – if the food for the juveniles does not move in the same way as for the adults, then the species range will not change.
While it might be tough to predict exactly how fast things will change, or what it will lead to, the general message from this study is clear: change is coming to marine ecosystems. We can’t take the current distribution of marine life for granted.

Nemo isn’t the only transgender fish in the sea

Out to burst the bubble of Disney enthusiasts everywhere comes the revelation that Flounder of the Little Mermaid might have been an XX-male fish.  It’s not just Nemo who is deceiving you!  Then again, the fish named Flounder in the cartoon has no real resemblance to an actual flounder or any other flatfish.

Southern flounder (Paralichthys lethostigma), like many flatfish, have a critical window during the juvenile stage when sex can be reversed.  When southern flounder are between 35–65 mm, phenotypic sex is determined. This means:  if flounder are genetically male (XY) they stay male and develop as males.  However, genetically female flounder (XX) have plasticity and may develop phenotypically as females or males.  Under good conditions, the flounder develop as female.  Under poor, stressful conditions the flounder become sex reversed XX-males.

It is believed they do this because it is energetically less costly to be a male than to be a female, who have higher growth rates and must produce eggs.  The XX-males grow just like normal males and produce sperm (as seen in captivity), it’s just that they can only contribute “X” chromosomes to the next generation.  Unlike clownfish, once sex is determined during this window it is locked in, flounder do not change sex later in life.
So what’s the big deal?  A few more males in the population, so what? More choice right?
In any population, throwing off the sex ratio can be detrimental for population growth and sustainability.  Generally females are needed more as each female produces fewer eggs than a male counterpoint can produce sperm.
In southern flounder populations, the additional twist of sexual dimorphism makes a more male skewed population have greater negative effects.  Female southern flounder grow faster and larger than males.  Thus the fishery (both recreational and commercial where applicable) consists almost solely of female fish.  In many states, to take home a legal sized fish is to take home a female fish, as males do not tend to get longer than 12-13 inches, but regulations are set at larger minimum sizes in most of the range of Southern flounder (NC-15 in, SC-14 in, TX-14 in).  These limits are not meant to target females, but rather let them have one year of spawning before recruiting to the fishery.

30mm (hatchery) southern flounder.

The main driver and stressor causing sex reversal in southern flounder is water temperature, which is on the rise.  In general, higher water temperatures cause sex reversals to male flounder.  Studies of flounder (southern flounder and a variety of flatfish species) sex reversal in the lab have shown for years the connection between non-optimum water temperatures and male skewed sex ratios.  Another lab study presented the effect of tank color on masculinization.  More importantly, tests revealed than an increase in the stress hormone cortisol increase production of males.
For the first time we are testing the sex ratios of juvenile southern flounder in wild fish. Our current research captures young-of-the-year juvenile flounder after the period sex determination, but while they are still in the habitats they settled into and grew during the sex determination window.  This is key because we can monitor the water temperature and other environmental aspects of this habitat to be able to connect to the juvenile southern flounder.  At such small size, one cannot visually determine the sex of the flounder gonads, but we can test the gene expression levels of various hormones to determine the sex of these individuals.
Our recent studies in North Carolina of wild fish have shown a trend of masculinization of southern flounder in the mid-to-southern ranges of flounder in the state.  Water temperature records indicate these areas are just 1-2°C higher than the northern areas.  Thus, just small changes cause big results.  As water temperatures are predicted to rise 1-2°C due to climate change in the future.

Interestingly, despite recordings of less than optimal temperatures for Texas southern flounder, limited sampling of wild caught flounder juveniles in the last two years have shown close to 50/50 sex ratios of juveniles through gene expression analysis of hormones produced by gonads.  This sampling covered only a small part of the Galveston Bay habitat, so we recommend more wide spread sampling before strong conclusions can be drawn.
This early detection is key to possibly be able to predict if a large or small year class of females will be moving through the ranks; which could possibly help managers in adaptive with management policies and inform population analysis.  Sex ratio information could help in classifying if particular places or habitats produce more females and thus should be higher on the priority list of protection and preservation.  In other places, such as Texas, where a flounder stock enhancement program exists, this testing can help guide areas as to where the flounder are being stocked.  We are also working with the stock enhancement program in Texas evaluating the sex ratios of their hatchery stocking fish to help develop best practices for potentially stocking the most female fish into the population.
So what does this mean?  States still report that females dominate the adult population despite our studies showing skewing towards males in the juvenile stage.  So are males having differential (and less) survival to adulthood?  Or are they congregating in a completely different area than other females?  Either could be true.  Though much of the data about flounder population sex ratios is older or potential biased by where fish are collected.
What happens if we get a decreasingly male population?  Theoretically as long as high water temperatures or other stressors cause sex reversal and all XX population could continue with part of the population sex-reversing during the juvenile stage to fulfill the role of male producing sperm.
However, will this be enough to sustain the population over time?  If males do not survive as well as females (possibly due to slower growth even at a young age) would enough live through this critical stage to service the adult population?  In the lab, we have found that XX-males function the same as regular males, but does this hold true for fish in the wild?  Could the sperm they produce not really be up for the job?  All questions we hope to answer with future studies.

If Nemo's kids can't find home

The transition from a pelagic to a benthic lifestyle is a crucial phase in the life cycle of many marine organisms. During early stages of development, dispersal of planktonic larvae may be mostly driven by currents; however, larvae progressively develop behavioural and physiological competencies that allow them to locate, orient towards and selectively settle in suitable benthic habitat. Competencies acquired during development include increased body size, development of functional fins and strong musculature, as well as sensory capabilities necessary for navigation and habitat selection. This set of adaptations means that settlement is far from a stochastic event.

Research has shown that acoustic cues help in the settlement of marine fishes and some invertebrates. Electrophysiological studies also revealed that the sense of hearing becomes more important throughout larval development and that at this particular life stage they are able to hear particular frequencies, an ability lost later in life. It is also known that some fish species have a very narrow window of competency for settlement. It seems likely that both findings are connected and that hearing guides little fish toward their future home.

A new study published today provides some more proof for the assumption that the interpretation of normal ocean sound cues helps juvenile fish to find an appropriate home. However, tests conducted as part of the study also showed that fish were completely confused under the levels of CO2 predicted to be found in oceans by the end of the century as a result from Ocean acidification:

Here we show that larvae of a catadromous fish species (barramundi, Lates calcarifer) were attracted towards sounds from settlement habitat during a surprisingly short ontogenetic window of approximately 3 days. Yet, this auditory preference was reversed in larvae reared under end-of-century levels of elevated CO2, such that larvae are repelled from cues of settlement habitat. These future conditions also reduced the swimming speeds and heightened the anxiety levels of barramundi. Unexpectedly, an acceleration of development and onset of metamorphosis caused by elevated CO2 were not accompanied by the earlier onset of attraction towards habitat sounds. This mismatch between ontogenetic development and the timing of orientation behaviour may reduce the ability of larvae to locate habitat or lead to settlement in unsuitable habitats. 

BSCC Awards 16 Counties Grants to Help Mentally Ill Offenders

SACRAMENTO (June 10, 2015) – The Board of State and Community Corrections today awarded $17.1 million in grants to help 16 counties develop strategies to reduce recidivism among mentally ill juvenile and adult offenders.
The competitive grants were authorized when the 2014-15 State Budget Act appropriated the Mentally Ill Offender Crime Reduction Grant funds to support prevention, intervention, supervision, services and strategies to improve outcomes for offenders with mental health issues.

Successful applicants submitted Requests for Proposals that would implement collaborative, multidisciplinary approaches to reduce crime and criminal justice costs for the mentally ill through prevention, reductions in jail crowding, aftercare services for adult and juvenile offenders, and alternatives to incarceration for youthful offenders.

The BSCC received 20 proposals totaling $19.2 million for adult MIOCR projects, and 15 proposals totaling $13.4 million for juveniles. A total of 24 counties applied, with 11 of those seeking both juvenile and adult funding. Three counties succeeded in securing dual funding.

Counties proposed to receive juvenile MIOCR funding are: Santa Clara, Contra Costa, San Joaquin, Nevada, Riverside, Santa Cruz, San Diego, Orange, Yolo and Solano (partial award).

Counties proposed to receive adult MICOCR funding are: Los Angeles, Solano, San Luis Obispo, Alameda, Santa Cruz, Santa Clara, San Francisco, Madera and El Dorado (partial award).

The Board of State and Community Corrections was established by 2012 legislation to serve as an independent body providing leadership and technical assistance to the adult and juvenile criminal justice systems.

A synopsis of the winning bids by county follows:

Juvenile Proposals

Contra Costa County ($950,000)
The Transitioning Out to Stay Out (TOSO) project will provide Functional Family Therapy to juvenile offenders and their families following an existing program of court-mandated therapy to improve transition from custody to the community. TOSO will be a supplemental layer of service beyond the suite of court-mandated services provided by the County to serious, persistent teenage male offenders and to sexually-exploited/repeat-offending female youth -- groups who are at high-risk for re-offense.

Nevada County ($750,000)
The Strengths, Opportunities, and Recidivism Reduction (SOARR) project will provide an intensive wraparound model for treating mental illness, eliminating barriers to recovery, teaching and reinforcing pro-social behaviors, and reducing recidivism. Wraparound services will be provided to the county’s seriously mentally ill youth and their families and to those youth most at risk of an out-of-home placement, such as hospitalization, incarceration, or congregate care. Treatment will be designed to address the therapeutic needs, functional impairments, educational needs, and community resource deficits that frequently results in reoffending.

Orange County ($1,060,539)
The Orange County project will provide integrated and individualized plans for mentally ill youth diagnosed with, but not limited to, mood-based disorders (depression, anxiety, bi-polar, etc.), trauma disorders, psychotic disorders, and those with co-occurring substance use disorders. Services will be provided through case management planning to ensure youth are referred to appropriate in-custody and community-based resources such as employment, housing, education, substance abuse and other supportive services as required. The continuum of services includes a multi-phase structure encompassing assessment, recidivism and relapse prevention, intervention, supervision, prerelease treatment, transition planning, insurance needs, wraparound services in the community, and sustained aftercare up to age 25.

Riverside County ($948,510)
The Intensive Re-Integration Services (IRIS) project is a collaborative, three-phase approach to support mentally ill juvenile offenders with successful community reentry. The first phase uses intensive in-custody treatment programs targeted toward addressing both significant mental illness and recidivism through multi-modal, evidence-based practices and strategies. The second phase focuses on reentry planning for youth, including appropriate housing, educational services, employment opportunities, job skills training, life skills development, and community reintegration skills. The third phase focuses on community supervision of the youth using either Functional Family Probation or Wraparound.

San Diego County ($950,000)
The Screening, Assessment, and Services for Traumatized (SAST) Mentally Ill Juvenile Offenders project will provide short-term, cost-effective evidence-based interventions that are proven effective for traumatized youth. The SAST project will expand early identification and intervention for high-risk, high-need youth with mental illness and broadens the service continuum to reduce recidivism and improve outcomes by targeting trauma. Youth and their caregivers will receive Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Cognitive Processing Therapy, both of which reduces PTSD and depression.

San Joaquin County ($949,073)
The Court for Individualized Treatment for Adolescents (CITA) Juvenile Mental Health Court will provide a specialized treatment model to address the mental health needs of mentally ill juvenile offenders, address the root causes of offending, and will provide a range of supportive services to help youthful offenders and decrease recidivism. CITA project will include expediting early intervention through the timely screening and referral of participants, using a dedicated team approach, intensive supervision of participants, and having the judge at the center of the treatment and supervision process. Interventions include Cognitive Behavioral Interventions (CBI) within the Juvenile Justice Center and in the community, Trauma Focused CBI, Aggression Replacement Training, and CBI for substance use.

Santa Clara County ($946,250)
The Successful Outcomes and Active Reengagement (SOAR) project will implement culturally responsive evidence-based intervention throughout the county juvenile justice system. Components that will significantly impact mental health outcomes for youth and involvement with the juvenile justice and dependency systems include training of mental health providers in El Joven Noble and Cara y Corazon curricula, the addition of a social worker to the Dually Involved Youth Unit, services for commercially sexually exploited (CSE) youth and the formation of a youth advisory council. Project SOAR will allow for more targeted service to CSE youth, all of whom are challenged with serious emotional and mental illnesses.

Santa Cruz County ($950,000)
The Familias Unidas En Respecto, Tranquilidad y Esperanza (FUERTE) project (Families United in Respect, Tranquility, and Hope) will address the individual and family’s therapeutic needs and criminogenic risks in order to reduce recidivism, reduce unnecessary use of detention through community-based alternatives, improve individual functioning, and increase family capacity/skills. Treatment matching through screening and assessments, in-home therapy for the youth and family, intensive case management, and linkages to community-based resources will be the core services provided. Additional services may include therapeutic groups addressing aggressive/criminal behaviors and outpatient substance use/co-occurring disorder treatments.

Yolo County ($950,000)
The Yolo County project will expand the county’s current wraparound services to juveniles involved with the juvenile justice system and who have co-occurring mental health andsubstance abuse diagnoses. The project will coordinate a team using multiple resources, members from various agencies such as social services, behavioral health providers, and justice partners, and most importantly, the family. The wraparound program will coordinate appropriate services to provide adequate treatment for youth and provide interventions that will improve youth and their family’s functioning across multiple life domains to provide a smooth transition for youth back into the community while reducing the likelihood of recidivism.


Adult Proposals

Alameda County ($948,459)
Operation My Home Town (OMHT) is an intensive pre- and post-release case management program that is effecting a paradigm shift in reentry services for adult inmates. Participants in the program will receive extensive validated assessments, develop Individualized Reentry Plans with their Clinical Case Managers (CCMs), and engage in pre-release services (e.g., education, vocational training, cognitive behavioral interventions, restorative justice circles), and receive post-release case management. CCMs will assist participants’ transition to the community and provide referral and support services until reentry goals are met for up to a year post-release. CCMs will also assist participants with enrollment for public benefits.

Los Angeles County ($1,834,000)
Nemo Resideo project (meaning no one left behind) will provide a comprehensive and integrated discharge plan, as well as jail in-reach, intensive community-based services and housing to tri-morbid offenders (seriously mentally ill individuals with co-occurring disorders and a chronic medical condition). The program is an enhanced discharge planning program that will include jail in-reach by the community-based organization that will provide the wraparound services, intensive case management and housing upon release, as well as identification of service locations, treatment providers, a medical home, and a dedicated pharmacy.

Madera County ($869,547)
The Behavioral Health Court will bring together multi-organizational collaboration to coordinate court-ordered integrated treatment, supervision and community resource plans for mentally ill offenders in order to achieve optimum results of reduced jail recidivism and criminogenic risks. Necessary resources for participants include access to housing, access to prescribed psychotropic medication, intensive supervision and case management services. The project will also include transitional housing accommodations and securing residential treatment beds.

San Francisco County ($950,000)
The San Francisco project will create a Behavioral Health Court (BHC) specifically designed to improve outcomes among adults with mental illness who are accused of misdemeanor offenses. As part of the BHC, continuum of care services and responses include direct housing services to support temporary and transitional housing for offenders, subsidized transportation, employment skills training, and incentives forparticipation in cognitive behavioral therapy and evidence-based interventions such as Moral Reconation Therapy and Wellness Recovery Action Plan. A peer specialist will also be included to support BHC clients through the process.

San Luis Obispo County ($950,000)
The San Luis Obispo project will implement a collaborative and multidisciplinary program designed to provide for a Behavioral Health clinician at pre-trial to screen mentally ill offenders as they are being sentenced to provide an alternative to incarceration, in-custody evidence-based treatment services, increased capacity within the community clinic to provide walk-in medication and screening appointments for post-release offenders in order to provide an immediate and seamless reentry of the client into the community from jail. In-custody treatment services include Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Psychosis, Criminogenic interventions (Moral Reconation Therapy), and trauma-focused treatment (Seeking Safety).



Santa Clara County ($950,000)
The In-Custody Reentry Team (ICRT) will support the successful reentry of inmates with a serious mental illness. The ICRT will employ incarceration-based, prevention-oriented case management and discharge planning to program clients, linking them to post-release services and increasing engagement in the types of treatment and support services that will improve their quality of life and reduce their chances of recidivating. The ICRT will work with serious mentally ill offenders from booking to release, establishing a reentry case plan within days of a mental health referral and following the client through incarceration to their release to service linkages.

Santa Cruz County ($949,995)
The Mentally Ill Offender Continuum of Care project will address the effects of mentally ill offenders in the local criminal justice system including this population’s typically longer average length of stay in the County Jail due to their distinctive needs, the impact of untreated offenders with psychiatric disabilities in the community, and the need to draw from the evidence-based practice and intensive treatment of the Forensic Assertive Community Treatment (FACT) model. The project will provide pre-offender interventions as prevention opportunities through law enforcement liaison personnel, provide post-arrest diversion programming through in-custody dual diagnosis treatment services, Probation pre-trial and supervision services, and expand capacity for the FACT team.

Solano County ($949,998)
The Solano County project will create a county-wide response to the issues of services, treatment, and recidivism reduction for the justice-involved mentally ill. The project will divert low level offenders prior to and shortly after booking, will provide Jail-based mental health programming for sentenced and certain un-sentenced offenders based on assessment, and will provide comprehensive reentry planning and intensive case management aftercare services to the participants prior to and after release. The County will create Collaborative Teams to direct the work of the diversion and reentry/aftercare components of the project and will use the evidence-based practice Critical Time Intervention to guide the reentry and aftercare process.

'Finding Dory,' sequel to Ellen DeGeneres' 'Finding Nemo,' set for 2015 release

‘Finding Nemo’ took in $921 million worldwide in 2003. Now fans can look forward to its sequel starring Ellen DeGeneres’ beloved character, ‘Finding Dory.’

Ellen DeGeneres is going fishing again with a sequel to the animated blockbuster "Finding Nemo."

Disney and its Pixar Animation unit announced Tuesday that DeGeneres will reprise her "Nemo" voice role for "Finding Dory." The sequel is due out Nov. 25, 2015, and will be directed by Andrew Stanton, who also made "Finding Nemo."

"I have waited for this day for a long, long, long, long, long, long time," DeGeneres said. "I'm not mad it took this long. I know the people at Pixar were busy creating `Toy Story 16.' But the time they took was worth it. The script is fantastic. And it has everything I loved about the first one: It's got a lot of heart, it's really funny, and the best part is - it's got a lot more Dory."

The new film picks up about a year after the action of "Finding Nemo," with DeGeneres' forgetful fish Dory on her own adventure to reunite with loved ones.

According to Disney, the film will feature new characters along with familiar ones, including Nemo and his dad, Marlin, who was voiced by Albert Brooks. There's no word yet from Disney on whether Brooks will reprise his voice role.

"Finding Nemo" was released in 2003 and took in $921 million worldwide. The movie was the first Pixar production to win the Academy Award for best animated feature after the category was added in 2001. Pixar films have gone on to dominate, winning the Oscar seven years out of 12.

About Nemo fish

Personality

Nemo is very energetic young clownfish. He's very eager to go to school at the beginning of the movie, but lazy at the end. He is also quite friendly with anyone he meets. His father's overprotectiveness leads to him being frustrated most of the time. He leads him into being captured by fishermen. Adventuring and exploring are some of his likes.

He can also be very brave, as shown when he was willing to risk his life to jam the filter after hearing about all his father had done to come and save him and when he willingly entered a net that captured a school of fish to lead them to freedom.

His relationship with his father is what defines the film. Although Nemo loves his father, initially, he felt suffocated and confined by his father's overprotectiveness, which led him to tell Marlin "I hate you." However, after being kidnapped by some scuba divers and placed in a fish tank, he felt sorry for what he did but did not believe his father would come to get him due to his paranoia and fear of danger. However, after learning of his father's bravery, he became braver and hopeful, wanting to quickly meet up with and reconcile with his father, which he managed to do at the end of the film.

He also demonstrated remarkable leadership, as shown when he led a school of fish to direct them to swim downward to break the net that captured them.

Appearances
Finding Nemo

Nemo is a young clownfish who lives with his father, Marlin in a sea anemone. Before he hatched from his egg, Nemo's mother, Coraldisappeared, and the other eggs were killed in an attack by abarracuda. Only Nemo's egg survived, albeit slightly cracked. As a result of the crack, one of Nemo's fins is smaller than the others, thus Marlin worries about him. One day, Nemo heads off to his first day of school. At one point, he boldly leaves the reef to go to a boat on the open ocean. Marlin, who is watching, orders Nemo to come back, when Nemo is suddenly taken by a diver to a fish tank in a dentist's office in Sydney, Australia.

In the tank, Nemo meets the Tank Gang, and their leader, Gill. The fish are horrified when they learn that Nemo, whom they have dubbed "Sharkbait," is to be a gift for the dentist's niece, Darla. Darla has a past history as a "fish-killer" and so the Tank Gang decide to help Nemo avoid that fate. The initial plan to make the tank dirty fails when the dentist installs a new cleaner. While the plan is being carried out, however, Nemo learns from Nigel the pelican that his father is looking for him, which lifts the young fish's spirits.

When Darla arrives, Nemo is placed in a bag. Nemo is able to fool the dentist by playing dead, causing the dentist to flush Nemo into a drain. However, an observing Marlin believes that Nemo has really died and swims off. In the ocean, Nemo runs into Dory, who has earlier helped Marlin in his search for Nemo. Though Dory does not initially remember Marlin's goal, due to a short-term memory loss issue, she soon recalls it and leads Nemo to Marlin who is still brokenhearted.

Marlin and Nemo are thrilled to see each other, but Dory is suddenly caught in a fisherman's net with a school of grouper. Nemo is able to use the skills he obtained from his time in the tank to save Dory. This gives Marlin a new-found respect for his son's abilities, and Marlin becomes less protective of him. He smiles as he watches Nemo going to school.

Finding Dory

Nemo will be in an upcoming 2016 summer film Finding Dory, sequel to Finding Nemo. It has been announced that Hayden Rolence will voice him, due to the fact that Alexander Gould's voice has deepened since the first film.

Video Games

Nemo appears in Disney Universe as a costumed character. Nemo also appears in Kinect Disneyland Adventures as a main character in with in the mini game Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage based on the real life ride of the same name.

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Nemo as he appears at the Disney Parks.

Nemo appears in several Disney attractions including the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage at Disneyland, which is apparently a sequel to the film. The Seas with Nemo & Friends, located in Epcotat Walt Disney World Resort, also features Nemo. The ride's storyline has various characters from the film searching for Nemo, who has apparently become lost once again. Nemo, and other characters, are featured as articulated puppets in Finding Nemo: The Musical at Disney's Animal Kingdom. Duplicates of the Nemo puppet have appeared in various parades at other parks.

Gallery

The Disney Wiki has a collection of images and media related to Nemo.

Trivia
Nemo is the first ever Disney titular tritagonist
In Monsters, Inc., Nemo appears as one of the toys that Boo gives to Sulley after she returns to her room. He also appears on the wall of the Trailer Son and Mom's trailer when Sulley and Mike throw Randallthrough the door.
A Nemo sticker is seen on Andy's toy chest in Toy Story 3.
Nemo also makes a quick cameo in Brother Bear during the scene where Kenai disrupts the salmon fishing.
Nemo's name could very well be a reference to Captain Nemo from Jules Verne's novel 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and Disney's 1954 film adaptation.
Nemo, in turn, is actually Latin for "no one." In the aforementioned novel, Captain Nemo was so called since nobody ever knows what his real name is, if he ever had one. For the record he was an Indian prince named Dakkar.
Nemo's friend Sandy Plankton could be a reference to Nickelodeon's SpongeBob SquarePants, as "Sandy" and "Plankton" are names of characters from that show.
Nemo is only three inches in length.

15 Things You Might Not Know About 'Finding Nemo'

Although we now recognize 2003's Finding Nemo as one of Pixar’s most critically and commercially successful films, the underwater masterpiece didn’t exactly kick off production as a guaranteed goldmine. Here are a few little-known facts about the rocky road leading up to the film’s status as a bona fide blockbuster.

1. THE FILM WAS INSPIRED BY THE DIRECTOR’S OVERPROTECTIVE NATURE.

“Autobiographical” isn’t exactly the first adjective you’d expect to assign to a road comedy about marine life, but Finding Nemo co-writer-director Andrew Stanton’s story came from a very personal place. As a relatively new father during the film’s development, Stanton found himself at odds with his proclivity to veer into overprotective territory, much in the way viewers see Marlin combating his neuroses in raising his son Nemo. He also had a love for all things aquatic that dated back to a childhood fascination with his dentist’s fish tank, so Stanton used this lifelong interest as a funnel for a deeply emotional story about the challenges of being a good father.

2. STANTON WROTE A SCRIPT LONG BEFORE HE WAS “SUPPOSED TO.”

Pixar’s multitiered film production process begins with a basic premise pitch to the creative higher-ups, followed by (for all greenlit projects) a written story treatment. Stanton already had a script completed before this second step took place, the only Pixar project to proceed in this manner.

3. IT TOOK ONLY ONE WORD TO GET THE GREEN LIGHT FOR FINDING NEMO.

“You had me at ‘fish.’” That is precisely what John Lasseter, Pixar’s chief creative officer, said to Stanton following his exhaustive pitch for his passion project.

4. THE MOVIE’S ART TEAM WENT THROUGH MARINE TRAINING PRIOR TO PRODUCTION.

In order to get the look and the feel of Finding Nemo’s characters and atmosphere just right, Pixar’s in-house art team was required to take courses and audit lectures in marine biology, oceanography, and ichthyology while enrolling in scuba diving classes.

5. DOGS WERE USED AS MODELS FOR THE FISHY FACIAL EXPRESSIONS.

While the Pixar team’s extensive research on the denizens of the deep yielded a wide variety of spectacular shapes and colors perfectly suited to an animated feature, the underwater populace proved consistently lacking when it came to one anatomical component. The dull eyes of the average finned critter weren’t especially conducive to building expressive characters, so Pixar had to look elsewhere for its optical models. The crew chose one of the most openly expressive members of the animal kingdom on which to model the eyes of its fish characters: dogs.

6. THE ORIGINAL SCRIPT HAD A DIFFERENT TREATMENT FOR THE BARRACUDA INCIDENT.

At first, Stanton kept the inspiration for Marlin’s overprotective attitude—the loss of his wife and all but one of their unborn children in a barracuda attack—a secret to reveal gradually through intermittent flashback sequences. Ultimately, this technique made the revelation obvious and anticlimactic while making Marlin feel substantially less likable, so the script changed.

7. GILL WAS A VILLAINOUS CHARACTER IN AN EARLIER VERSION OF THE STORY.

While the combination of somber coloration, a scowling beak, and the menacing vocals of Willem Dafoe render Nemo’s fish tank pal Gill an intimidating presence, we learn soon enough that he is in fact a good guy who has the best interests of his fellow captives at heart. The original cut of Finding Nemo was more ambiguous about Gill’s integrity, however, making him the owner of a falsified identity that he swiped from a nautical-themed children’s book housed in the dentist’s waiting room.

8. MEGAN MULLALLY WAS FIRED AFTER PRODUCERS HEARD HER REAL VOICE.

In the early 2000s, Megan Mullally was best known for her Will & Grace character, the rude and eccentric Karen Walker. Chief among the character’s recognizable characteristics was her high-pitched voice, which Pixar producers apparently thought would be perfect for an animated fish. Upon hiring Mullally to voice an undisclosed character in the movie, the crew discovered that the actress’ natural voice was of average pitch and that Mullally was unwilling to reproduce “the Karen voice” for the film. As such, Mullally was dismissed from the Finding Nemo cast.

9. ALBERT BROOKS REPLACED ANOTHER BIG STAR.

Although Brooks’ background in films like Broadcast News and Mother seems like it would have made him an obvious candidate to play the high-strung Marlin, the first actor cast in the role was William H. Macy. The Fargo star recorded his dialogue for an early screening ofFinding Nemo, but producers ultimately felt that he lacked the warmth required for the role of the father fish.

10. THE DIRECTOR RECORDED ALL OF ONE CHARACTER’S DIALOGUE WHILE LYING ON A COUCH.

Stanton never intended to commit his voice to the final cut of Finding Nemo, but only to sub in as a placeholder until the right actor could be cast to play Crush, the easygoing sea turtle with the California accent. Perhaps due to his understanding of his vocal contribution as merely temporary (or maybe, in fact, to get into the “slacker” mindset of his character), Stanton recorded all of Crush’s dialogue while lying on a couch in the office of his co-director, Lee Unkrich.

11. THE CEO OF DISNEY THOUGHT FINDING NEMO WOULD BE A FAILURE.

The combination of a poorly cast Marlin, an unsympathetic Gill, and the running flashbacks made the earliest versions of Finding Nemo feel pretty dismal. Still, nobody was quite as defeatist as Michael Eisner, the Walt Disney Company's then-chief executive officer. Eisner predicted the underwater adventure would be a “reality check” for the yet unchallenged Pixar. Eisner’s only positive spin was that a commercial struggle would be helpful during contract renegotiations with the Disney subsidiary. Of course, Eisner’s judgment, and fund-cutting aspirations, came up short when Finding Nemo became Pixar’s highest grossing film (a superlative it would maintain until the release of Toy Story 3 in 2010).

12. THE MOVIE’S POPULARITY LED TO POPULATION STRESS FOR CLOWNFISH.

Children were so taken with the adorable Nemo following the release of the film that demand for clownfish as pets instantly skyrocketed. Excessive capture and sale of the ocean dwellers led to a steep decline in the organic population of the species; some natural habitats, such as the waters surrounding Vanuatu, saw a 75 percent drop in clownfish numbers.

13. THE MOVIE ALSO LED TO SOME MISGUIDED FISH LIBERATION MOVEMENTS.

On the other hand, Finding Nemo’s anti-tank agenda did provoke a few ecologically-minded viewers to set their aquatic captives free. Unfortunately, not everyone took the necessary steps to ensure that their newly liberated pet fish were being transported to amenable waters. Certain marine communities suffered from the introduction of predatory and venomous species in unnatural locales, resulting in, once again, ecological imbalance.

14. SEVERAL ORGANIZATIONS RELEASED “ANTI-FLUSHING” PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENTS FOLLOWING FINDING NEMO.

While tanked fish Gill’s proclamation that “all drains lead to the ocean” contains a grain of truth, the movie fails to acknowledge the fact that a flushed fish is unlikely to survive a trip down the typical drain. Water treatment company JWC Environmental and Australia’s Marine Aquarium Council were among those to offer public warnings that flushing would prove fatal to any pet fish. The former organization suggested that a movie that realistically portrayed a household sea creature’s voyage through the municipal sewage system would be more accurately titled "Grinding Nemo."

15. A CHILDREN’S BOOK AUTHOR UNSUCCESSFULLY ACCUSEDFINDING NEMO'S CREATORS OF PLAGIARISM.

A year before the release of Finding Nemo, French author Franck Le Calvez self-published the children’s book Pierrot Le Poisson-Clown, featuring a young clownfish on a quest to reunite with his estranged mother. (In fact, Le Calvez first wrote the story as a screenplay in 1995, but was unable to generate interest in the concept.) After Pixar’s admittedly similar tale hit theaters, Le Calvez sued the studio for copyright infringement, but lost two lawsuits and wasordered to pay $80,000 in damages and court costs.

FINDING NEMO

"Finding Nemo" has all of the usual pleasures of the Pixar animation style--the comedy and wackiness of "Toy Story" or "Monsters Inc." or "A Bug's Life." And it adds an unexpected beauty, a use of color and form that makes it one of those rare movies where I wanted to sit in the front row and let the images wash out to the edges of my field of vision. The movie takes place almost entirely under the sea, in the world of colorful tropical fish--the flora and fauna of a shallow warm-water shelf not far from Australia. The use of color, form and movement make the film a delight even apart from its story.

There is a story, though, one of those Pixar inventions that involves kids on the action level while adults are amused because of the satire and human (or fishy) comedy. The movie involves the adventures of little Nemo, a clown fish born with an undersized fin and an oversized curiosity. His father, Marlin, worries obsessively over him, because Nemo is all he has left: Nemo's mother and all of her other eggs were lost to barracudas. When Nemo goes off on his first day of school, Marlin warns him to stay with the class and avoid the dangers of the drop-off to deep water, but Nemo forgets, and ends up as a captive in the salt-water aquarium of a dentist in Sydney. Marlin swims off bravely to find his missing boy, aided by Dory, a blue tang with enormous eyes who he meets along the way.

These characters are voiced by actors whose own personal mannerisms are well known to us; I recognized most of the voices, but even the unidentified ones carried buried associations from movie roles, and so somehow the fish take on qualities of human personalities. Marlin, for example, is played by Albert Brooks as an overprotective, neurotic worrywart, and Dory is Ellen DeGeneres as helpful, cheerful and scatterbrained (she has a problem with short-term memory). The Pixar computer animators, led by writer-director Andrew Stanton, create an undersea world that is just a shade murky, as it should be; we can't see as far or as sharply in sea water, and so threats materialize more quickly, and everything has a softness of focus. There is something dreamlike about the visuals of "Finding Nemo," something that evokes the reverie of scuba-diving.

The picture's great inspiration is to leave the sea by transporting Nemo to that big tank in the dentist's office. In it we meet other captives, including the Moorish Idol fish Gill (voice by Willem Dafoe), who are planning an escape. Now it might seem to us that there is no possible way a fish can escape from an aquarium in an office and get out of the window and across the highway and into the sea, but there is no accounting for the ingenuity of these creatures, especially since they have help from a conspirator on the outside--a pelican with the voice of Geoffrey Rush.

It may occur to you that many pelicans make a living by eating fish, not rescuing them, but some of the characters in this movie have evolved admirably into vegetarians. As Marlin and Dory conduct their odyssey, for example, they encounter three carnivores who have formed a chapter of Fish-Eaters Anonymous, and chant slogans to remind them that they abstain from fin-based meals.

The first scenes in "Finding Nemo" are a little unsettling, as we realize the movie is going to be about fish, not people (or people-based characters like toys and monsters). But of course animation has long since learned to enlist all other species in the human race, and to care about fish quickly becomes as easy as caring about mice or ducks or Bambi.

When I review a movie like "Finding Nemo," I am aware that most members of its primary audience do not read reviews. Their parents do, and to them and adults who do not have children as an excuse, I can say that "Finding Nemo" is a pleasure for grown-ups. There are jokes we get that the kids don't, and the complexity of Albert Brooks' neuroses, and that enormous canvas filled with creatures that have some of the same hypnotic beauty as--well, fish in an aquarium. They may appreciate another novelty: This time the dad is the hero of the story, although in most animation it is almost always the mother.

The Dirty Truth About 'Finding Nemo'

As we've mentioned several times before, Disney movies are far from the innocent cartoons they pretend to be. And Pixar, which joined Disney in 2006, isn't slacking on their end, either.

Take Finding Nemo. It's a heartfelt father-and-son story in which an entire family of clownfish (Amphiprion ocellaris) is viciously devoured by a barracuda, and then the son is abducted by scuba divers and forced into performing peepshows for a sociopathic human child.

"Well, son, doom surrounds us 360 degrees and 24/7, but thankfully we're evolutionarily unequipped
to truly comprehend the gravity of our situation."

Marlin, the father of the titular clownfish, goes on a harrowing journey to rescue his son. With the help of Ellen DeGeneres the Fish, Marlin outsmarts sharks, whales, hungry birds, and jellyfish. Nemo and Marlin are reunited and -- with their odyssey over -- live happily ever after.

Disturbingly happily ever after.

We touched on this topic briefly before, ignorant of the implications -- but sometimes ignorance is bliss. You see, a clownfish colony -- which doesn't stray far from its anemone host -- is dominated byone male and one female. These two are the only ones who are trading fluids in the entire group. Why? Because all clownfish are born male. Why? Because Mother Nature is one crazy broad.

Seriously, lady, there are children here.

Naturally, the next question is "Where did that male clownfish get his woman bits from?" Well, clownfish are sequential hermaphrodites, meaning that the male can transform himself into an intoxicating lady quicker than Wesley Snipes in To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar.

"This is my daywalker disguise."

So what does this mean for Finding Nemo? Well, when the female in the colony dies or disappears, the dominant male will change into the dominant female, and the fish who was waiting in line behind him takes over as the new top guy.

Remember that Nemo's mom became fish food in the first act, along with all of Nemo's brothers. This makes Marlin the dominant male, and Nemo the second-most dominant. Are you starting to pick up what we're putting down, preferably while wearing latex gloves?

You know that tiny fish egg that Marlin nurtured, cared for, and almost died for? Yup, he was totally just trying to get his son home so they could repopulate their colony.

In other words, once Marlin rescued Nemo from that Australian dentist, he basically led his son to the anemone boudoir, popped on "Lemon Incest" by Serge Gainsbourg, spread his new ladylike fins, and bellowed "TODAY YOU BECOME A MAN AND THE MAN OF THE HOUSE."

We're going to go scrub ourselves clean now. With steel wool.

And given the fact that Pixar meticulously researched marine life for Finding Nemo, someone during the production process must have realized, "Hey, we're totally making a more fucked-up version ofOedipus Rex starring fish."

We're not going to grouse about biological accuracy here -- this is a movie with a talking sea turtle, after all -- but if you're going to make a heartwarming G-rated animated flick about a father-son duo of anthropomorphized fish, maybe you shouldn't choose a species that bangs the shit out of its relatives during an emergency. Likewise, this knowledge makes Finding Nemo on Ice a billion times more mind-shattering than it normally is.