octopus climbing out of tanks

"Nehmo" wrote in message ps.com...
That story seems to say the crabs would win against the octopus. I
suppose it depends on how big they were. But, yes, you're right,
there's no video. Certainly, videos back then were rare.

I'm beginning to conclude the traveling-oct story has no truth to it.
Since plenty of people keep them as aquarium subjects, behavior as
bizarre as this would have been better documented by now.

There was a video about it, it is called "The Octopus Show".
It is part of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC "Journeys With Wildlife" series.
I got it on DVD from eBay.co.uk - maybe you will find it also.
I do not remember if there is actual scene in the movie with octopus
actually doing the trick or if there is only a verbal report about it
done by the comentary voice...

But they are strange and probably smarter than we give them credit
for. I knew a girl who used to take walks on Portuguese fishing boats.
She said there were piles of freshly-caught still-alive octopuses on
the deck. When you walked past, the octopuses would follow you with
their eyes. She said you could see the expression of resignation an
pleading in their eyes.

Typical example of applying human interpretation to animals...
Not necessairly true interpretation.

"Nehmo" wrote on 13 Apr 2007 03:1:
I'm beginning to conclude the traveling-oct story has no truth to it.
Since plenty of people keep them as aquarium subjects, behavior as
bizarre as this would have been better documented by now.

Have you read any advice about keeping octopuses as in home tanks? They
*all* say that it's an absolute requirements to have a secured, locked lid on
top of the tank. Octopusus are well known for being able to escape out of
supposedly-secure tanks, through any opening no bigger than their beaks.
They can definitely unscrew jar lids, unlatch locks, and walk across dry land.
There's really no question that this is possible, even common. Get yourself
an octopus, put it in an open tank, put on a night-vision camera, and I'm
sure you can make the video you wish within days or perhaps even hours.

In public aquaria (which have huge tanks, huge octopuses, and are difficult to
fully secure in 3D), the keep-them-in-their-cage trick seems to be astroturf.
For reasons that aren't fully understood, octopuses don't seem to like to walk
across astroturf. So the big open tanks that have octopuses in them tend to
have a foot or two of astroturf border nailed around the top rim.

But they are strange and probably smarter than we give them credit for.

There are lots of experiments involving puzzle-solving with octopuses.
Opening sealed jars with food inside, escaping from tanks, etc. They're
pretty well known to be among the most intelligent animals in the world
(like dolphins, whales, dogs, monkeys, etc.).

Also (vaguely related), for fun, don't miss the "Octopus vs. Shark" video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4dV6upaCvo

__________________________________________________ _____________________________
Don Geddis http://reef.geddis.org/
The only use of Tae Kwon Leep is self defense. Do you know who said that?
Ki Lo Nee, the great teacher. -- "Boot to the Head", The Frantics

In a previous article, Alan Brooks said:
An effective bait for catching octopuses (Fowler discourages the use of
"octopi") is said to be a colorful bit of rag at the end of a fishing line
(cf. John Fowles, "The Magus"), which seems to set an upper bound on this
cephalopod's intelligence.

Yeah, but you're only catching the dumb ones.


--
Paul Tomblin http://blog.xcski.com/
I find that anthropomorphism really doesn't help me deal with hardware all
that much, because it lends a certain attitude of disdain to what would
otherwise be a mere malfunction. -- Carl Jacobs

On Apr 13, 9:00 am, Bill Turlock "Bill Turlock
wrote:

Don't anthropomorphize the octupii, they hate that.
But, all seriousnes aside, I clearly remember seeing a film a
long time ago where an octupus would crawl out of its tank and
unscrew a mason jar with a food-critter in it. I suspect that
they are very intelligent. But not intelligent enough to avoid
getting caught.


You only think that because you don't know about the ones that haven't
been caught.

P

Wasn't it Bill Turlock who wrote:

But, all seriousnes aside, I clearly remember seeing a film a
long time ago where an octupus would crawl out of its tank and
unscrew a mason jar with a food-critter in it.

I remember seeing something very similar to that, but at no time was the
octopus out of the water. It squeezed through water-filled tubes and
through narrow holes, but never crossed a dry surface.

--
Mike Williams
Gentleman of Leisure

Mike Williams wrote:

Wasn't it Bill Turlock who wrote:

But, all seriousnes aside, I clearly remember seeing a film a
long time ago where an octupus would crawl out of its tank and
unscrew a mason jar with a food-critter in it.

I remember seeing something very similar to that, but at no time was the
octopus out of the water. It squeezed through water-filled tubes and
through narrow holes, but never crossed a dry surface.


OK, revise that to read, "I not very clearly remember..."

Yep, it's true. There are many accounts of octopus
climbing out of aquariums and eating from nearby
aquariums. And there are many reports of people
finding them flat on the floor, and they pick them
up with a spatula and put them back in the aquarium.

And there are also many incidences of fish jumping
out of aquariums, so I don't know why people would
be surprised for an octopus to climb out of the
aquarium :-)

At the same time there are reports of people keeping
octopus without any covering and claim that it never
got out. But then how do they know that it never got
out? :-)

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets


Nehmo wrote on 4/13/2007 3:44 AM:
There are mentions on the web of an octopus climbing out of a tank,
traveling across a dry surface, going into another tank, grabbing a
fish for a meal, and then returning to their home tank. Some web-
comments say there is a video that was on TV. But I haven't found
anything like it on the web. Is this behavior possible? Is this story
true?

--
(||) Nehmo (||)

Howdy,

Octopuses are often very accomplished escape artists and crawling
across a few feet of dry surface is within the capabilities of a large
one; I'm sure that the distance capability would be related as much to
size as to species. That said, I'm also sure that when an octo climbs
out of the water its number one priority becomes finding some other
water to climb into, available food would be a side issue.

What is fairly common is for an octo to 'visit' other tanks via shared
plumbing. Unscreened drain lines especially are plenty big enough for
even a good sized GPO to fit. I'm not aware of any video but there are
numerous stories from public aquariums in the Pacific Northwest of
GPO's sneaking into an adjoining tank for a crab dinner and then
returning to its own tank and den.

I very much doubt that an octopus would be bothered by finding itself
in a tank with large crab or lobster, both of which are prey items for
octos. They might be too big for a given octo to capture and eat but
it's pretty unlikely that they'd present any threat either.

BTW: Here's a link to a Google video (39 seconds) of an octopus
escaping through a one inch hole:
http://video.google.com:80/videoplay...16107763801953

Regarding the "food in a jar" trick: As I understand it, the original
experiment was carried out in the wild and went something like this:

1. A researcher using SCUBA located and developed a rapport with one
particular Octopus (I vaguely recall that it was in the Mediterranean)
by feeding it shrimp.

2. One day the researcher showed the octo the shrimp, put the shrimp
in a jar, closed the jar with a cork, and gave the jar to the octo.
The octo took several minutes to figure out how to open the jar and
then ate the shrimp.

3. The experiment was repeated several days later and the octo opened
the jar almost immediately; possibly demonstrating memory or the
ability to learn an artificial task.

4. On a subsequent repetition of the experiment the researcher showed
the shrimp to the octo whereupon the octo swam into the jar and waited
for his meal!

At the Feiro Marine Life Center, where I volunteer, we would give our
smaller GPO (tip to tip arm-span ~ 4 or 5 feet) a squid in an old
peanut butter jar (clean of course) with a plastic screw top lid. On
the first try it took her about five minutes to get to her meal;
subsequently she would remove the lid in under a minute.
Unfortunately, one of our staff decided to give her a crab as a treat
and thereafter she completely lost interest in squid - in or out of
the jar. We also tried the jar on our larger GPO (5 or 6 feet tip to
tip) and she also managed to figure it out but there was no repetition
after we learned how difficult it was to retrieve the empty jar from
her den. [Her tank is almost five feet deep.]

As to escape proofing an octopus tank - Ya gotta do it! Nine times out
of ten escaping means a death sentence for the animal since they're
most likely to try when there isn't anyone around to put them back. I
don't know if this is just Murphy's Law or a case of the octopus
waiting for everyone to leave. Having said that, the likelihood of an
escape attempt seems related to species and individual personality. O.
rubescens has a reputation as being an absolute demon escape artist,
probably because they've evolved to sometimes live in the intertidal
region - they don't find being out of water to be nearly as traumatic
as do some other species. OTOH: The popular O. bimaculoides (the Two-
Spot octo) seems to be far less likely to escape. The Enteroctopus
dofleini (GPO's) that we keep each year all seem to react differently
to captivity; some absolutely hate it and are constantly trying to
escape while others seem to think that free food and no predators is a
pretty sweet deal. [We return the unhappy ones to the wild as soon as
their dissatisfaction becomes apparent.]

About the two male octopuses "fondling" each other: I'd be very
surprised if, in reality, they weren't trying to work out who was
going to 'have' dinner and who was going to 'be' dinner.


Cannibalistically yours,

Alex

A number of years ago, my next door neighbor worked as an Aquarist at
Sea World (in Orlando, Florida). He told me that this actually
happened there. An octopus was observed leaving it's tank, "walking"
about 5 feet, entering another tank, catching and eating a fish, and
returning to it's tank. As unbelievable as it sounds, according to Sea
World Orlando, this is an established fact. These are indeed very
intelligent animals.

hj


In article .com,
Veronique wrote:

On Apr 13, 1:44 am, "Nehmo" wrote:
There are mentions on the web of an octopus climbing out of a tank,
traveling across a dry surface, going into another tank, grabbing a
fish for a meal, and then returning to their home tank. Some web-
comments say there is a video that was on TV. But I haven't found
anything like it on the web. Is this behavior possible? Is this story
true?


I heard this directly from a curator at the Monterey Bay Aquarium: a
particular mollusk kept being reduced to shells in one tank and no one
couldn't figure out what had happened, although initially the octopus
in the next tank over was suspected. The octopus' tank had a lid and
the lid remained undisturbed, however, so that couldn't be it. A video
finally captured the octopus sliding open the lid of its tank,
escaping to the mollusk tank and having a meal, returning to its tank
*and sliding the lid closed*.


V.
--
Veronique Chez Sheep

Wasn't it Haywood Jablowme who wrote:

A number of years ago, my next door neighbor worked as an Aquarist at
Sea World (in Orlando, Florida). He told me that this actually
happened there. An octopus was observed leaving it's tank, "walking"
about 5 feet, entering another tank, catching and eating a fish, and
returning to it's tank. As unbelievable as it sounds, according to Sea
World Orlando, this is an established fact. These are indeed very
intelligent animals.

Well yes, we started from the idea that there are lots of friend-of-a-
friend type stories about this.

--
Mike Williams
Gentleman of Leisure