When do the New-born's Start Learning?

I you have access to a dock, take a slow quiet walk out on the dock or peer and look down into the water around the pilings or other dock or walkway structure, you might see a large classroom full of new bass fry gathered around the structure. We are now in the post-spawn period for bass and nature is already starting it education of the young fish. Less than an inch long, I recently watched a school of hundreds of tiny fry rapidly moving from one piling to another as if they were being taught the safety rules of survival. When I moved and my shadow moved, the school of fish also scattered but rapidly returned to a tight school near another piling. When I tapped on the deck, they again scattered and then re-gathered to hide.

My guess is that these small bass were no more than one week old and they already knew the basic rule of survival. Each time they noticed me they would scatter but then they would quickly re-group tightly together, apparently knowing that there was safety in numbers. If the small fish had already learned this rule in less than a month after their birth, can you imaging how smart they will be when they are one year old? And some say that fishing is not a skill!