Phew. There ain't enough smelling salts in the world!

Or microscopes either.

I was going to post the blob fish, but gave that away elsewhere, lol.

Instead, I've been totally fascinated by this octopus lately. There's a few videos around of them disguising themselves as all kinds. It's freaky and amazing, love it! If you've not seen it before, you have to watch this video!

http://www.theatlantic.com/technolog...evable/277310/

It's a great video - cephalopods are just fascinating.

I am going to post some videos of Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni later this week.

The Colossal squid is the largest and heaviest invertebrate on the planet.

The best site for all things cephalopod is Tonmo.

http://www.tonmo.com/community/

But if I can find it again I recently viewed a very obscure Russian video of a live colossal squid that no western scientist has ever seen - at least it has never been mentioned on any site that I have read.

I nearly joined Tonmo when I found it just to post them the images.

I watched a video a few times a while back and can't find it since. The octopus disguises itself as sea worms and everything, it's awesome, in the true sense of the word. I'll have another dig soon and see if I can find it.

That is the remarkable mimic octopus (Thaumoctopus mimicus). There is tons about it on the net.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-LTWFnGmeg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8oQBYw6xxc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dCUbCdmuzA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dvz5rYixLMk

Found the footage and the article (it does need google translate which pops up on the top right of your screen when you click the link.)

As I say this particular Mesonychoteuthis sighting has never been mentioned anywhere in the Western scientific literature as far as I am aware!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8fSg8mMObo

http://polit.ru/news/2013/03/25/ps_colossal_calamar/

You are brilliant! Thank you

You are very welcome.

Going to kip now but will post more on this subject soon.

Look forward to it!

Apart from this documentary about the giant squid

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cs6KqpZ1PIE

This article from the National Geo.

http://animals.nationalgeographic.co...s/giant-squid/

The Giant squid (which you have posted above) are a totally separate species from a completely different family from the Colossal squid though.

Mesonychoteuthis is far heavier and even better armed than the Giant squid (Architeuthis dux) - though perhaps not quite as long - and we know even less about it than we do Architeuthis, which is why the video I found is so exciting.

It is one of only a couple that exist of this massive cephalopod and even Tonmo does not seem to have it on their Cranchiidae section.

http://www.tonmo.com/community/forums/cranchiidae.41/

I've always read that the Mongolian Deathworm was the inspiration behind the Graboids from Tremors. This reminds me of it, too. And there's no doubting that this monster actually exists.

Never heard of the frilled shark, what a fantastic creature.

Oh my god, that gives me the heebie-jeebies big time.

They are really awesome creatures and the biggest are a metre across - here are a few nice articles and videos on them.

http://www.wired.com/2013/12/absurd-...of-the-week-2/

http://www.arkive.org/coconut-crab/b...atro/#text=All

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress....-thats-a-crab/

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...l#.U_GnD_ldXuJ

http://www.nerdist.com/2014/04/mirac...-coconut-crab/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z54da6-fz94

http://31.media.tumblr.com/8412dae83...rijeo1_500.jpg

http://images2.memedroid.com/images/...29185f45b.jpeg

And if I was this dog I would be very careful indeed.

http://www.justmemes.com/wp-content/...conutcrabs.jpg

I'm afraid I would have no choice but to never leave my house again if I saw one of those beasts near my rubbish bin. It's like something out if a syfy movie. Eeeeeek!!

A lovely recent Natural World documentary on the first time in history that a living Architeuthis (Giant squid) was filmed in it's deep-sea habitat.

Any person with an interest in cephalopods should watch (if they have not seen it already) and also adding to the enjoyment of the production is that the narration is by the legendary David Attenborough.

The big surprise for me was the incredibly beautiful shining silvery-gold colour of the living animal - the dead ones are always white with fragments of red as their skin is so very delicate out of the water.

Enjoy.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x12...mpossible_tech

I saw this a few months ago - brilliant film! So glad they actually saw the squid eventually!

These Sarcastic Fringehead fish look like a normal cute little fish...
http://cdn2.arkive.org/media/FC/FC66...g-from-den.jpg
Until they are ready to attack...
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-FyGI7lEKbi...fringehead.jpg

I saw this a little while back too, it's brilliant. Attenborough just makes it so much better too. I know what you mean about the colour of the living squid, it's beautiful. That's something to watch with my little boy tomorrow, thanks


Woah! You wouldn't want to piss him off!

Reminds me of the hag fish, the first one in this article

http://www.cracked.com/article_19871...in-nature.html

Those things excrete nasty slime when agitated. Looks like someone blew their nose in their hands.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5PGZRxhAyU

A friend of mine has a fish phobia. She can't walk past the fish counter in a supermarket. This thread would be her worst nightmare

That coconut crab would scare the crap out of you, should you happen to suddenly walk around a corner and see that sitting there. Imagine sitting on a beach and that thing wonders over.

I love the headline in the first article link about them - it says they tear open coconuts - fair enough given the name, then

'eats kittens' !!!

Not sure they would have survived this long if that's their other main source of nutrition....