Northwestern University

A peculiar observation was made here at the University of Evanston by biologist Frank Brown in 1954. He was investigating if oysters can keep time. He noticed that they open their shells to feed at high tide. But he noticed that they kept on doing this even if removed from the sea. He shipped a batch of oysters from the oceon off New Haven, Connecticut, to this spot. He kept the shellfish in a sealed darkroom, shielded from changes in temperature, pressure, water current and light. At first they kept their rythm of New Haven tides. But then, their feedingtime gradually shifted until they lagged 3 hours behind. They adapted to the local state of the moon. These selfish were tracking lunar time.

Brown's results were forgotten, and the notion of lunar influences was dismissed as pseudoscience.

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