NEWS: Fun with Cephalopods

GEEK: Fun with Cephalopods

Cephalopods are awesome. They are incredibly sexy and the most intelligent class of invertebrates. Due to the totally bomb-ass nature of these “head-foots,” I am hereby dedicating this month’s edition of "Awe and Wonder" to the cephalopod. And what better way to begin than with the sex life of octopuses!

Until recently, not much was known about the mating habits of octopodes due to their shyness (I don’t blame them; I’d be a little frigid if some pervy scholar were taking notes on how I like to get it on, too). But some intrepid biologists at UC Berkeley studying the octopus species Abdopus aculeatus have observed a number of surprising behaviors in the little Lotharios:

That sounds like more than a few of my ex-boyfriends. Strangling, striped body patterns... Chris, you were an octopus all along!

So if the pulpo macho thing doesn’t work out, the little dudes simply continue in the venerable tradition of Publius Clodius Pulcher and cross-dress to get to the ladies. I like this a lot; just think of a sea full of a bunch of little eight-legged Dr. Frank-N-Furters. So posh!

Moving across the cephalopods, we come to the squid. Now, we all know that cephalopods are quite squishy and apparently enjoy using this trait to crawl into jars (hat tip to the inimitable Karl Pilkington), so at some point I’m certain that quite a few people have begun to wonder how something so... so... gelatinous could manage to exist with a beak as hard and as sharp as it has. The critters are made for cutting themselves (whether or not squids enjoy the Cure is yet to be seen.)

Researchers at UC Santa Barbara (you Californians have all the fun!) have been studying the Humboldt squid, Dosidicus gigas, in order to figure out how this incredible beak works. It’s actually pretty amazing. The tip of the squid’s beak is exceedingly stiff, while the part attached to the squid’s body is 100 times more pliable, keeping it from tearing into the soft bits while still permitting the tearing-into of the soft bits of others.

UCSB engineer Frank Zok lays it out for us:

Truly fascinating, Dr. Zok!

Zok’s co-author, Herb Waite, focuses on something rather different than just the construction of a little beak—namely, what that beak can do:

Why are squids such fucking assholes? While their cousins are simply content strangling passers-by and dressing up like the opposite sex, squids run rampant through the ocean eating people or “hurting them a lot.” The Kraken is apparently real and lives off the coast of Santa Barbara. Take that, hippies!

Actually, the more I read about the Humboldt squid, the more I am convinced that this creepy cephalopod is probably the Antichrist. And, like any good Antichrist, homeboy is situating himself in Northern California.

This ravenous species of squid has left its usual habitat and has settled along the Pacific coast of the United States, eating up a number of species that we humans like to eat. The above video is worth watching if only to see a bunch of grizzled old fisherdudes completely freak out over these creatures, which, like some nightmarish Lovecraftian dream, eat anything that moves in a manner described as similar to how we eat corn on the cob. Anything that moves does, apparently, include humans. The fact that the first fisherman interviewed describes them as like “some kind of an alien that’s about to come after [you]” only serves to confirm the obvious: the Star-Spawn of Cthulhu are hanging out in the San Francisco Bay, eating people like corn, and waiting until the stars are right.

So, while octopuses are our sexy friends with whom we can rassle and dress up in women’s clothing, the squids are their evil twins bent on enslaving humanity and raising us as mere cattle. Like most people, I once thought the intelligence of these creatures to be “nifty” and “super-cool,” but it is indeed a great deal more sinister. As I write, I am forming a non-profit organization to investigate this tentacled peril. If you are interested in donating to this worthy cause, please send money, size 37 Louboutins, and/or first editions of 19th and 20th century occult texts to Flux Suicide c/o Grand Central Station.

Flux, of course, is quite fond of Northern California and sincerely hopes that you are not consumed by demon squids any time in the near future: certainly not before I make it to Zeitgeist again.

maybe i should date a octopus... or it reads as if i have.


more underwater articles. thx flux.