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Why do octopuses punch fish? - Yes they do this.
Octopus punches fish in the head (just because it can)
By Mindy Weisberger December 23, 2020
Why do octopuses have eight arms? The better to punch fish with, new research reveals.
These brainy cephalopods sometimes team up with fish to find food; hunting collaboratively like this allows them to cover more area, and it increases their chances of catching prey. However, when big blue octopuses (Octopus cyanea), also known as day octopuses, are displeased with their fish partners, they demonstrate their ire by suddenly punching the fish in the head.
The octopus lashes out using "a swift, explosive motion with one arm," in an attack "which we refer to as punching," scientists wrote in a new study.
By Mindy Weisberger December 23, 2020
Why do octopuses have eight arms? The better to punch fish with, new research reveals.
These brainy cephalopods sometimes team up with fish to find food; hunting collaboratively like this allows them to cover more area, and it increases their chances of catching prey. However, when big blue octopuses (Octopus cyanea), also known as day octopuses, are displeased with their fish partners, they demonstrate their ire by suddenly punching the fish in the head.
The octopus lashes out using "a swift, explosive motion with one arm," in an attack "which we refer to as punching," scientists wrote in a new study.
https://www.livescience.com/octopuses-punch-fish.html
21 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
with any your crap today ...
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It happened on a live cam which has been operating in the water in Bonaire, off the coast of Venezuela. An octopus socked one of those fish who always cluster around any octopus passing through! I thought it was because they are curious about them!
Here's the Bonaire link. It operates 24/7, sometimes goes down, and the new link shows up in the column in youtube to the right of the screen, under "live" .
Also, operated by the same international oceanic monitoring organization, in Hawaii:
Also, a great link which rotates, also, from a flat zone to a beautiful rocky coral zone,
between two shipping lanes in Miami:
Hover your mouse at the bottom of all three screens to see a red thin bar where you can review the last 12 hours of video at the site, as the cameras are operating around the clock. In Bonaire the light lingers at night a couple of hours after dark due to a light from a restaurant at the top of a hill of coral on the right side of the screen, and large fish come out to look for dinner, big guys like baracuda, cubera snappers, etc. Very interesting.
Thanks for the information, MoonRiver, which solved the mystery about why so many fish follow their octopus friends, and even get socked in the kisser for their trouble at times!
