But in my tank, it's a dart to the surface for food.

Camouflage is very important in Nature. Effective camouflage to a fish, is to us a pathetic attempt at hiding. My point is that we should try to see it from the fish's perspective, try to appreciate the value of these little things for helping fish feel safe, secure and happy.

Ahh, found these pics of the tank above showing close ups of holes, caves and overhangs under shelves:

Aloha,

Mark  

I believe fish also learn that they will find escape to safety if they jump. As a juvenile, a fish may have been temporarily trapped in a tidal pool and may have learned that to jump out and flop around was the way to reach deeper, open water or at least the next lower, larger tidal pool. They may have even repeated the action from pool to pool until they reached deeper, open water. 

It's kind of hard to find pics that show exactly, because most of my pics focus on fish or coral, but below are a few more pics of what I'm talking about regarding making areas for fish to dart into when frightened. Though it may not seem good cover to us, fish will often dive into a thicket of Macroalgae and seem to be perfectly comfortable with the camouflage it provides.

In this former tank that was in my bay window, there was a lot of space between rocks, with many holes going all the way through. Useful features were the caves/overhangs above the sand where fish could hang out and feel safe, yet to us they were easily visible.

Above and below: Ideal rubble rock/macroalgae environments for Firefish and Wrasse, as well as Mandarin and Scooter Blenny.

Aloha,

Mark  

Mark, I just can't agree with you here. I don't care how calm and relaxed a tank is, it only takes a wrasse a quick second to get startled and their natural reaction is to jump for safety.  But in an uncovered tank, it is jump to certain death.  A death that can easily be avoided with the screen top netting.

Aloha,

Mark