Giant Octopus

[gonetobaja]

There is a show on Giant Octopus tonight on History Channel,

MonsterQuest - Boneless Horror

The show is about looking for a Monster Octopus. There is some "attack" footage.

do you think that there are Monster sized species still undiscovered? Or do you think that all of the big monsters in the sea have already been found?

 

[300bar]

There are reports on spermwhales with "scares"on them from Giant squid.
Scares a foot wide,guess how big that squid must have been.
I'm sure I don't want to meet one of those.:no

 

[gonetobaja]

300,

Yea, Im sure that there is a huge squid out there in the deep, but what is your opinion about other types of animals. Do you think that the ocean still holds secrets or do you think that all of the big Monsters have already been discovered?

Dale

 

[300bar]

We only just starting to explore the oceans.Just a few % sofar.
Yes I'm sure we will find amazing new creatures.
Will they be Giants,who will tell,some might be, others will be tiny.
Most amazing imo sofar are the animals living on the highly toxic and very hot
blacksmokers.

 

[tomboyy]

300,

Yea, Im sure that there is a huge squid out there in the deep, but what is your opinion about other types of animals. Do you think that the ocean still holds secrets or do you think that all of the big Monsters have already been discovered?

Dale

I'm guessing plenty of secrets left, think about how many years we've really been looking. How big it is, and all the other variables.

Tom

 

[Hoomi]

I need to check my copy of Cousteau's book on the octopus. As I recall, it reported an anecdote about an absolutely humongus octopus that washed up dead on a beach in St. Petersburg, Florida, over a hundred years ago. IIRC, Cousteau wrote that tissue samples from this octopus are preserved in the Smithsonian.

This wasn't a giant octopus such as the Giant Pacific Octopus that is well documents in the Pacific Northwest, that grows to about 200 pounds and a six foot or so leg span. It's been a number of years since I read the Cousteau book, but it seems to me the St. Petersburg octopus was some ten times tht size.

I go pull the book off the shelf and see if I can find the reference, and post it.

 

[gonetobaja]

I guess we need to define what is a monster. I have seen some small stuff in the sea that if enlarged would certainly fit the nightmare category.

The lanternfish looks like a monster but its not very big. A 6 ft lanternfish would scare the you know what out of me though.

Dale

 

[alewar]

from the wikipedia:

The North Pacific Giant Octopus, Enteroctopus dofleini, is often cited as the largest octopus species. Adults usually weigh around 15 kg (33 lb), with an arm span of up to 4.3 m (14 ft).[13] The largest specimen of this species to be scientifically documented was an animal with a live mass of 71 kg (156.5 lb).[14] The alternative contender is the Seven-arm Octopus, Haliphron atlanticus, based on a 61 kg (134 lb) carcass estimated to have a live mass of 75 kg (165 lb).[15][16] However, there are a number of questionable size records that would suggest E. dofleini is the largest of all octopus species by a considerable margin;[17] one such record is of a specimen weighing 272 kg (600 lb) and having an arm span of 9 m (30 ft).[18]

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Biggest one I've seen, personally, we named "Popeye". He had suckers about as big around as a teacup and if spread out would've been possibly 15 feet, tip-to-tip. He was no monster, though. Octopus are generally reclusive critters that prefer to just be left alone ... I suppose that like any wild animal if you poke it aggressively enough it will try to flee, and if it can't flee it will defend itself. My guess is that the "attack" footage on the show was probably in that category. Octopus are often curious ... if you take off a glove (they don't like neoprene) and stick out your hand they will often "caress" it ... the suckers feel a bit strange, as they attach and release in somewhat of a progressive fashion ... but there's nothing unpleasant about it. The animal uses them to determine what you are, and once it determines that you're neither food nor mating potential it will usually ignore you.

Giant Pacific Octopus are short-lived critters ... generally living only about five years. They start life about the size of a grain of rice (I have had the pleasure of watching a "hatching") and are somewhat larval at that point ... like most babies their head's too big and their legs are too short ... and of a hatching of 70,000 or so, perhaps only two or three will live to be adults. The majority will become fish food at some point fairly early in life.

I didn't see the TV show (don't watch TV, generally) ... but heard enough about it to write it off as sensationalist garbage ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Hoomi]

Okay; my old memory isn't quite what it used to be. It was actually St. Augustine, Florida, not St. Petersburg. Anyway, here's the quote from Octopus and Squid by Jacques Cousteau and Phillippe Diole, pg. 217:

In at least one case, the existence of a giant octopod has been recognized by scientists. The account given by F.G. Wood, in the prestigious Natural History magazine, deserves to be repeated here. In researching the archives of the Laboratory of Marine Research in Florida, Wood discovered that, in 1897, the remains of an apparently enormous cephalopod had been found on a beach in St. Augustine. The remains indicated that the cephalopod was larger than any specimen ever observed. The cadaver, which weighed six tons, was examined by an expert Professor Verrill, of Yale University, who was the discoverer of much of what is presently known about cephalopods. Professor Verrill estimated the specimen, when alive, had had a stretch of approximately 25 feet, and that its arms had been about 75 feet long. Woods even found in the archives a photograph of the cadaver.

The same author learned that there was, in the Smithsonian Institute, a large barrel containing animal tissue, preserved in formaldehyde, which bore the label, Octopus giganteus verrill. This tissue, beyond a doubt, constituted the fragment of the "monster" found at St. Augustine.

Wood asked a friend of his, Joseph F. Gennaro, Jr., to analyze this tissue. Obviously, this was rather difficult to do. After sixty years, the tissue had a very strong odor; and its long bath in formaldehyde and alcohol, after a period on the Florida beach, made a cellular examination precarious. Nonetheless, in comparing histological specimens of the tissue to specimens of cetacean, octopus, and squid tissue, Gennaro was able to establish that the monster of St. Augustine was, in fact, an octopus; and a giant octopus, with arms from 75 to 90 feet long, which measured, at the base, eighteen inches in diameter. "It is difficult," wrote Gennaro, "to believe in the existence of a marine animal the total length of which is more than 180 feet." And yet, it seems that, for the first time, it was proved by Wood and Gennaro that such an animal did exist. Unfortunately, no such specimen has ever been taken alive. Those which have been found on the surface have all been dead, or dying, and were smaller than the St. Augustine specimen.

If you ask me, it's probably very good that such a large octopus has never been taken alive. When you consider that octopus are reported to exert a tractive force of ten times their body weight, a six ton octopus would pull sixty tons. Even if the strength did not remain consistent at ten times the body weight, even a tractive force of five times the weight would be something formidable.

Edit: More details about the St. Augustine octopus can be found here.