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Aussie Scientists Find Coconut-Carrying Octopus

Posted by timothy on from the concealed-carry-in-australian-waters dept.

An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from an AP report: "Australian scientists have discovered an octopus in Indonesia that collects coconut shells for shelter — unusually sophisticated behavior that the researchers believe is the first evidence of tool use in an invertebrate animal. The scientists filmed the veined octopus, Amphioctopus marginatus, selecting halved coconut shells from the sea floor, emptying them out, carrying them under their bodies up to 65 feet (20 meters), and assembling two shells together to make a spherical hiding spot. ... 'I was gobsmacked,' said Finn, a research biologist at the museum who specializes in cephalopods. 'I mean, I've seen a lot of octopuses hiding in shells, but I've never seen one that grabs it up and jogs across the sea floor. I was trying hard not to laugh.'"

4 of 205 comments (clear)

  1. Video by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Informative

    From the BBC.

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    My work here is dung.
    1. Re:Video by ChameleonDave · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'm not sure from the Google Scholar description of this 1999 paper whether it refers to mention of octopus tool use in 1940 or in Roman times:

      ... Historia, Liber IX, 48; Plinius Secundus, 1940) reported a description of tool-using behaviour ...

      Perhaps someone with a subscription can check it out.

      No need. Pliny's Natural History was published at some point around AD 78. However, when you cite your sources as a scholar, you put the date of the edition you have in your hands. Hence, this person put "1940".

  2. Re:Intelligent by NoYob · · Score: 5, Informative

    I once had a pet octopus. It was small about the size of a fist all curled up. It was always moving things around the tank and rebuilding his or her stone "house".

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    It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
  3. Re:Octopus & the Goldfish by Ksevio · · Score: 3, Informative

    There was one aquarium where the octopus was eating the sharks at night before they finally noticed. There's a video on youtube of the octopus attacking that's pretty cool.