IIRC, some scientific team is working on a project that involves attaching video cameras to sperm whales, who feed on giant squid. Whale finds squid, camera takes pictures of titanic struggles between deep sea leviathans; camera eventually falls off the whale, floats to the surface. Scientists recover camera-- ta da!
I saw that tv show about the cameras on whales. They stuck one on a sperm whale, and they followed the whale down to about 1000 feet. They also discovered that sperm whales (those ones anyways) dive in a tight group, even brushing against one another. In the last couple seconds of film, you see a huge whale body bump into the camera, which knocked it off… end of experiment. Pictures of giant squid from these cameras would be more than we have now, but they wouldn’t be great. The camera is stuck onto the back in around the blow-hole, which is at least 10-15 feet back from the snout; and underwater photography has a very limited range due to turbidity, light, etc. At the depths these things would feed on squid, there would be little to no light available for the camera to work on. You might get a glimpse of a tentacle or something, but no panoramic full-body view of the giant squid. Would still be interesting though…
I saw the episode of “Fishing With John” when John Lurie and Dennis Hopper went to Thailand to catch a giant squid. They performed a special squid dance and even stole a boat from the local squid monks. In the end though, it was just like the NOVA special. The giant squid is just too elusive.
Everybody’s covered the giant squid, but in re to the “St. Augustine Blob” I heard a talk by one of the guys who has examined some of the few remaining samples.
No DNA, because this thing washed up almost a 100 years ago and was poorly preserved.
At the time, one naturalist speculated that it might be a giant octopus, but he based this on the photos and not the actual specimen. He also later changed his mind, but by then it was in the popular press.
To sum up the talk I heard: the blob is giant mass of collagen. Electron microscopy revealed the tell-tale patttern of collegen. The researchers compared the patterns in the blob to squid, octopus, and whale tissue. Whales would have different patterns than invertabrate squids and octopii. The patterns were constistant with whale skin.
So basically, the conclusion was the blob is a huge piece of collagen remaining from the skin of a dead whale.
I thought I still had the journal article, but I couldn’t find it. This is the reference (I think):
SK Pierce, GN Smith, TK Maugel, and E Clark; 1994 On the giant octopus (Octopus giganteus) and the Bermuda Blob: Homage to AE Verill. Biological Bulletin.
I’ve been following this topic in general curiosity for a long time, and I made sure to visit the sites mentioned above (for pictures and news) before making this entry, and I can still say…
It is TRUE that so far, not one single “real” giant squid has been seen alive (or perhaps no one’s lived to tell that tale), nor found, except for the partial remains found (until Aussie’s recent find, New Zealand had the biggest part of one), and the huge diameter scars on whales made by the teeth of the suckers of the giant squids are the evidence on which we base the calculation of the size of the beasts.
The suckers on the tentacles found in Kaikoura, New Zealand, were about the size of our puny human heads, (!!!), and the entire circumference of each suction cup was formed of razor-sharp teeth which dig into the flesh to get an extra-firm grip. These teeth also prevent the prey from escaping the grip from the sheer force of acceleration on the way to the beak. Talk about whiplash… And imagine the size of that beak! Nice, huh?
No photographs, no entire bodies, no live specimens ever actually seen. Yes, Virginia, there definitely IS a Santa Claus, BUT we haven’t found him, stuffed him, and hung him in a museum Just Yet… People on a boat can probably suppose with accuracy that a giant squid is present, (they can see it’s enormous size and shape) but there’s no filmed evidence, and no entire bodies have found their way to shore just yet. Should we believe they had an encounter? Dunno about y’all, but I would definitely believe it.
I also heard that some of the first “whale-cams” were destroyed by the pressure of innerspace, although I know its relatively easy to determine a max depth thought to be dived by the whales in a given area, and make sure the camera is actually able to withstand this pressure. Am I missing something here, or should they have rang me for the answer to that calculation?
Okay, I know the links provided in earlier comments to this subject would “seem” to show that recently, the remains of a giant squid (or MOST of one) was found by the Australians, and I have this comment: It might have seemed to be giant, but it’s not THEEEEE giant squid.
An interesting note, about the links proveded: The Australian web-news clip stated the beast to be roughly 11 or 12 metres, but the Canadian web-news clip stated that the portion found (the body and I think the head) was 3.5 metres, and they SUPPOSE/calculate that IF the tentacles / grabby bits which extend, If the tentacles were still attached, it would be approximately 11 or 12 metres.
So, my friends, the 3.5 metre squidbody recently found is far from the 18 or 20 metre variety which is truly THE giant squid. ALTHOUGH, I must admit, 3.5 metre squids are no pretty thing, and probably the last thing I’d consider a welcome sight while exploring innerspace, and I certainly would respect it as a giant – just not as THE giant.
Cheers.