Monday, June 19, 2006
Big Red
We found this big red octopus (thats the common name of this species not a particularly rubbish description of this individual) on Monad Shoal (my number one dive site in the world) whilst looking for Manta rays. Its fairly unusual to see them out and about like this in the day but I think it was fairly confident about moving from hole to hole due to the low viz. Octopi are very varied creatures, the range of species using similar design to live different life cycles is remarkable. I always feel like octopi are assessing you as they stare at divers with those beautiful eyes. They are remarkably intelligent compared to almost any other invertebrate and on occasion will actively initiate contact with divers; I'm proud to be able to say shaking hands with an octo is an experience like no other.
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2 comments:
Shaking hands with an octopus? I wouldn't be that brave. Not sure how large this creature is - what's the scale? Great photo.
this one's pretty big for its species Pam, the head bit is maybe 5 inches(ish) across.
the one who grabbed my hand was much smaller and a different species - I'll post pics another day. Even the small ones are surprisingly strong, especially considering they have no bones.
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