Animal Science | Mollusks - Octopus
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Fun Facts
Octopus came from the Greek word októpus, which means eight-foot
Around 289 species of Octopoda
Eight arms
Carnivores – eat clams, shrimps, lobsters, fish, sharks, and even birds
Most species have suction cups on the bottom of each arm
Suckers have receptors. They can taste what they touch
Bulbous head
Solitary creatures
Prefer crawling than swimming. Because the organ that delivers blood to organs stops beating, which makes the octopus exhausted
3 hearts. One pumps blood through organs, the other two through gills
Blue blood, because it has a copper-based protein called: Hemocyanin
Hard parrot-like beak on the underside, where the arms converge
Squirt ink to scare predators away. Make temporarily blind, or dull smell and taste
Boneless & soft
Squeeze into or out of tiny spaces
Quite smart, like house cats
Can lose their arms and regrow them
Some species have warts
Able to use tools
Females tend to be Cannibals
Females are often larger than Males
Male: One tentacle is like a 'penis'
Female: Male 'penis' needs to get stick in a hole on the head, which the female normally uses to breathe and expel waste (Aristotle said: 'The nostril of the Female')
~200,000 to 400,000 eggs will be hatched. Just a handful will survive
Both males & females will go fast into the dementia-like state of being after mating called: Senescence. The male will die alone because of weakness, and Female after hatching the eggs (Sex leads to death for them)
A baby octopus called larvae
Arms have their own mind. Two-thirds of the neurons are in the arms, not the head. This means that arms can do different things at the same time.
The Smallest octopus: 'Octopus wolfi' (2.5 cm long / less than a gram)
The Largest octopus: Giant pacific octopus 'Enteroctopus dofleini' (5 meters long / 50 kg) – They recorded a bigger one (9.1meter / 272 kg)
Habitats: Near water surface in shells, reefs, crevices. Some are on the floor.
Some hunt at night, others only at dusk and dawn
Can change colors like blue, gray, pink, green
Swim fast by sucking water into their bodies and shooting it out a tube called Siphon.
Short life span. From 6 months to 5 years. The larger, the older they get
Some species have short arms like 'Opisthoteuthis adorabilis'
The oldest octopus fossil lived 296 mil years ago – millions of years before dinosaurs
