The water is full of darting and jumping fish, and the mangrove roots -- some the height of a double-decker bus -- tower over the boat.

BBC: Relaxing among the Yucatan's flamingos

In his Upper West Side office, Mark Kurlansky, author of The Big Oyster, a chronicle of the rise and fall of the bivalve in New York, is couched by a hotch potch of model ships, statuettes of jumping fish, an atlas, piles of novels, foreign language dictionaries, encyclopedias and loose papers.

FORBES: Oysters Are Back In New York City Waters

While it was still early in the season to be jumping to conclusions, the Gulf coast native fears the migratory paths of fish went haywire after the oil spill.

WSJ: Gulf's Fishing-for-Fun Culture Also Takes Hit

University of Maryland biologist Daphne De Freitas Soares and biology lecturer Hilary S. Bierman discovered the guppies' ability while using high-speed videography and digital imaging to analyze the jumping behavior of nine guppies from a wild Trinidadian species, Poecilia reticulata, related to the familiar pet-shop fish.

CNN: After a swimming start, guppies jump, researchers find