Beagle
July 13, 2003, 6:26pm
1
This one is real. It is no whale blob on the beach. It’s a seven meter squid.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 20 — A ghostly, 23-foot-long creature glides through the deep sea, its gossamer fins billowing against the black water. Its arms, more than half its total length, trail behind like delicate threads. The squid doesn’t react right away to the submarine’s approach, but it shoots away into the dark once the sub gets too close. Researchers have captured scenes like this on videotape eight times, in four different oceans, within recent years. That’s quite a lot of exposure for an animal that no one has reported seeing before…
…“This is well beyond a new species,” said Michael Vecchione of the National Marine Fisheries Service and the National Museum of Natural History, the lead author of the report in Science. “New species are a dime a dozen. This is fundamentally different.”
Who knows what else is down there?
Beagle
July 13, 2003, 6:45pm
2
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Oh sure, work now. I blame society.
Violet
July 13, 2003, 7:05pm
3
Wow! I wonder how it tastes.
Eilsel
July 13, 2003, 7:07pm
4
ROFL…lots and LOTS of calamari…
Beagle
July 13, 2003, 7:58pm
5
Morphology
Representative digitized video clips are available on Science Online (3). In most cases, the squids were first encountered within a few meters of the sea floor with their extremely large, terminal fins undulating slowly and with arms and tentacles typically held in a unique position: spread outward from the body axis, then abruptly bent anteriorly (Fig. 1, A and B). None of these squids were collected, but all share the following morphology: The arms cannot be distinguished from the tentacles (modified ventrolateral arms of decapod cephalopods), appearing as 10 identical brachial appendages, all of about equal thicknesses and lengths. The relative length of these appendages is far greater than the arm length in any known squid, although all appendages are highly contractile. The filamentous distal portions of the brachial appendages appeared lighter in color than the rest of the animal in some videos. During extreme close-ups of squids 7 and 8, suckers could be seen along the oral surfaces of the proximal arms but not on the filamentous segments distal to the elbowlike bends.
Most of the squids did not appear initially to react to the approach of the submersibles. In one case (squid 4), no escape response was noted even when the brachial appendages brushed the sample basket. After a few minutes, one animal (squid 7) moved slowly away, flapping its fins but with the arm crown still spread (Fig. 1D). However, when most squids either touched a submersible or encountered its turbulence, the escape reaction consisted of strongly flapping the fins and towing the retracted brachial crown (e.g., Fig. 1C). When squid 7 changed from hovering to rapid swimming, the first pulse included a contraction of the mantle, but no jetting was observed subsequently. One squid (squid 5) became entangled in the submersible and seemed to have difficulty releasing its arms and tentacles; during its attempts to swim away, multiple appendages stretched greatly.
Calamari? Not really cost effective, being at that depth. Probably tastes like chicken.
Has anyone listened to the commentary on the video on the MSNBC link? Sometimes, I swear scientists aren’t the brightest…
quote:
Now, I’m not a marine biologist, but IF the thing really IS a squid, then I have a pretty good guess…and I actually caught myself talking to my laptop screen, saying, “They’re for grabbing shit! Sheesh…!”
Eilsel
July 14, 2003, 12:16am
7
LOL Dirk…
I was just thinking (uh oh)…
Does this mean this is a “fundie” squid :eek:
Eilsel
July 14, 2003, 12:17am
8
you don’t think I’ll get reported do ya?
