Houdini Octopus

An octopuses can change the colour of its entire body in just three-tenths of a second. But the creature doesn't simply take on the general pattern... more

by Miroslava Jurcik

Title

Houdini Octopus

Artist

Miroslava Jurcik

Medium

Photograph

Description

An octopuses can change the colour of its entire body in just three-tenths of a second. But the creature doesn't simply take on the general pattern of its surroundings. Instead, it often mimics specific undersea objects, like plants or rocks, to disappear into the underwater scenery.
This is the Common Sydney Octopus , body to 80cm, arm span up to 2m. Also called The gloomy octopus ,has a mottled brown and grey colouration with a rusty red colour lining the inside of each arm. They have a rounded body and head with characteristic eight arms that taper to a tip. The arms are uneven in length and each has two rows of suckers which are equipped with chemoreceptors, enabling the octopus to taste what it is touching.
A diver in Jervis Bay, Australia, initially spotted the unusual octopus behavior, writing about it in an online post that attracted the scientists' attention. To decode the octopuses' social "language," the scientists captured and screened 52 hours of footage of the Octopus tetricus species, a mottled, grayish-brown cephalopod known as the common Sydney octopus and also — somewhat more amusingly — the gloomy octopus. Despite its mopey-sounding name, what the scientists observed wasn't a community of isolated sulkers, but a highly engaged and interactive bunch.
http://www.livescience.com/53501-octopus-argue-through-body-patterns-and-postures-video.html

Uploaded

February 11th, 2017