Post by Deleted on Jan 4, 2010 20:01:46 GMT 10
Known varieties of octopus range in size from a circumference of a few inches to as large as 23 feet. There is some evidence that, deep in the sea, there lives an unknown species of octopus that can grow to over a hundred feet across and weigh 10 tons.
The giant squid is a known creature and they have been seen at sea. Several dead, or nearly dead, animals have been found in the shallows or beached. In contrast only one colossal octopus carcass has ever been found and it was, and still is, surrounded in controversy.
The story starts in November of 1896 when two boys cycling along the beach south of St. Augustine, Florida, came across the body of an enormous creature that had been washed up by the tide. Dr. DeWitt Webb, a local amateur naturalist and President of the St. Augustine Historical Society, took an interest in the remains. After an examination of the mutilated and decaying body he believed that he'd discovered the carcass of a huge octopus
Based on photographs sent by Webb, Verrill concluded that the creature was indeed a colossal octopus that might have had a diameter of one-hundred and fifty feet when living. Strangely enough, despite the importance of the find, Dr. Verrill, nor any other scientist, traveled to St. Augustine to view the carcass in person.
Webb finally sent Verrill a sample of the tissue of the creature preserved in formalin. Verrill was surprised to find it had the appearance of blubber and abruptly changed his mind stating that he now believed the creature was a whale and that the arms were not associated with the body.
The whole matter would have rested like that if it hadn't been for Forrest Wood, the director of Marine Studios (later Marineland) in Florida. Wood came across an old news story about the monster and discovered that Webb's sample was still stored at the Smithsonian Institution.
Wood persuaded the Smithsonian to let Dr. Joseph Gennaro, of the University of Florida, to take some of the samples for analysis. Gennaro immediately recognized that the material was not blubber and examination under a microscope showed the tissue was more similar to octopus than whale or squid. Further tests later confirmed this conclusion
In 1995, four scientists set out to take another look at samples of the St. Augustine carcass. Their results, published in the Biological Bulletin, disputes the other findings. These researchers looked at the amino acids in the remains and reached the conclusion they did not come from a invertebrate. They concluded the material was most likely the remains of a whale skin.
Other writers and scientists have disputed these findings noticing that it would be extremely difficult to removed the skin from a whale, intact, and get it to solidify into a three-foot-thick sold mass as was observed on the beach at St. Augustine.
How come more colossal octopi haven't been found? Speculation is that as a bottom dweller the colossal octopus bodies, upon death, stay on the bottom and decay leaving few clues for scientists to find. Perhaps as we start to explore the bottom of the sea further we may come face to face with a colossal octopus and look into his huge unblinking eyes
www.unmuseum.org/coloct.htm
Dont forget it was only a few years ago they thought the colossal Squid didnt exsist.