We’re maximizing our baby cephalopod time today with this baby octopus! This larval octopus was caught during ocean monitoring efforts with the Applied California Current Ecosystem Studies program in Cordell Bank and Greater Farallones national marine sanctuaries. Have you ever seen something so adorable?
Look closely and you can see small spots. Those are cells called chromatophores, which will help the octopus change color and camouflage itself as an adult!
[Video description: A small translucent spotted octopus swims in a tray of water.]
For those who feel so touched by a noodly appendage and wants to touch back, @franzanth‘s preposterous quick squid sketches are now available from 252MYA shop.
IT’S HAPPENING Y’ALL
Oh hey it’s Black Friday and for every purchase over $20 you’ll get a pack of six prehistoric animal stickers! Only valid for today!
Why is it called a Barreleye? Because it has barrels for eyes, of course! Actually, that’s just half the story…
Each eye is divided into two distinct parts. The larger, barrel section faces upward and is great for discerning the silhouettes of tiny, tasty copepods in the gloom above.
Next to those is the diverticular eye. These face downward and capture light using mirrors instead of lenses. This is particularly useful for gathering light, allowing the Spookfish to spot bioluminescent predators lurking below.
It doesn’t matter how flabby their muscles or gelatinous their flesh, no-ones sneaking up on the Brownsnout Spookfish!
Yeah, I see a lot of shark positivity posts on my dash these days and I really appreciate that. But I think something is being left out of the message so I’m just gonna say that:
YES, Sharks are not bloodthirsty monsters. They only do what they do because they are instinctively driven to do so.
NO, sharks are not your friends. They are not sea-puppies, gentle babies, or whatever BS anthropomorphic “cute” term you want to use to describe them.
YES, you are more likely to be killed by falling coconuts and any number of improbable circumstances than you are to be killed by a shark attack,
NO, sharks are not “harmless”. They are apex predators of their habitats and deserve to be treated with the same respect that you would give to a wild lion, bear, or wolf. JUST BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT LIKELY TO ATTACK YOU DOES NOT MEAN THAT THEY WON’T. ACCIDENTS CAN ALWAYS HAPPEN, AND A SHARK’S PATIENCE IS NOT LIMITLESS.
YES, you should take every precaution to prevent a shark from “test-biting” you.
NO, a test-bite is not just a harmless consequence of shark curiosity. A TEST-BITE CAN KILL YOU. Just because sharks generally release people after the first nip and don’t make any effort to eat them does not mean that the bite is somehow any less deadly. You will bleed out in the water if the wound is bad enough.
YES, sharks are endangered and unfairly demonised and worthy of our support.
NO, that does not mean that anthropomorphising them and spreading false information is okay.
Please support sharks, but please, for the love of god, give them the respect they deserve when you do so. YOU ARE NOT HELPING THEM BY ENCOURAGING PEOPLE TO SWIM RIGHT INTO THEIR JAWS.
Your annual Shark Week PSA. Sharks are incredible, thrilling creatures but spreading the idea that they are all harmless or interested in eusocial behavior with humans does them no favors.
“sharks aren’t vicious!!! they’re like huge puppy dogs!! they’re big sweethearts and i dont understand why people are scared of them!!”
“sharks do not attack humans in the way movies constantly portray them. sharks are curious, inquisitive animals and many bites come from sharks who “test bite” humans in order to see what they are/if they’re a threat, but that one initial bite can be fatal. while sharks are not monsters bent on hunting and targeting humans, human who hand feed them and treat them like any other animal causes more human-shark incidents (sharks can become used to humans feeding them and thus bite at a human to find fish). sharks are not blood thirsty maneaters, but they are an extremely powerful animal that deserves respect and should be admired from a distance.”
PiraticOctopus 