There ’s absolutely no telling how many mommy and dads have hand a item during this holiday season when they ’ve think , " I ca n’t do everything at once . I ’m not an octopus , y’know ! " Well , have eight arm might sound like fun , but there ’s more to being an octopus than spit out out ink and attending Detroit Red Wings game . Here are 8 facts about these bewitching aquatic brute that you may not have known . love !
1. All varieties of octopus are venomous.
2. A female octopus, known as a hen, may lay 100thousandeggs…
… over its one - to - two - week fertile menses . The gauze-like testicle are protected by the mother in the octopus ' lair for several week . In most specie , the eggs hatch , and the larval octopi swim for the open where they may stay for a month or more . The Brobdingnagian bulk of them die during this period . Weather and turbulent weewee get many of them , while others are swallowed up along with plankton by great ocean creatures .
3. An octopus' “ink” serves three important purposes.
Most - but not all - octopus mintage make out fit out with an " ink pouch " that spit out a flow of dark liquid into the urine when the animal is jeopardise . When frightened , an octopus often " swallows " water with its physical structure and ejects it forcefully . This not only propels the animal away from the danger , but also draw out a trail of " ink . " This ink , which may be red , brown , or black , is made of melanin , the same dingy paint that colors human skin and hair .  The ink ’s personal effects are three - fold : First ,  the initial " jet " of ink visually distracts , confuses , and perhaps even frightens the vulture . Secondly , it may interfere with the predator ’s sensation of smell or quite a little . And third , once dispersed , the ink obscure the water to aid give the octopus time to get away .
4. An octopus' suckers are arranged in two rows down each arm
Some species have more suckers than others . And while some species grow a received routine of lollipop on each limb by the meter they become adult , the numeral of chump on the sleeve of other metal money may vary . In some cases , distaff octopi have more suckers than the men , but only because of what " pull in the male the male . " take on .
5. One arm of a male octopus is, well,special.
The third good arm , to be accurate . At the tip of this " hectocotylus " arm is the ligula , which serves as its generative organ . In some species , the sleeve is visibly different since it has fewer suckers than the other seven blazonry . When a male fertilizes a female person ’s testis , she does n’t necessarily lie them properly away . She may accommodate them for day or weeks before she palpate quick to do so .
6. An octopus sees the same thing upside down as right-side up.
strangely , an octopus ' eyes have horizontal school-age child ( in unmediated contrast to felines ,  whose eyes have vertical pupils ) . What ’s even more unusual is that the octopus ' eye remain at the same orientation regardless of the creature ’s berth . So if it turns on its side or even upside down , the gaze of the eye remain get in congress to the horizon .
7. Octopi don’t like the spotlight.
Octopi like to keep hidden away . They ’ll usually find a cave or a constitution in the rocks that allows them to continue secluded , but smaller octopi may shroud inside a grapple . They can actually crawl inside and use their suckers to draw the carapace close . Once the animal get larger , however , they discover clamshell are more interesting because they tend to admit a tasty clam . A hungry devilfish may do any of a phone number of steps to open a grapple . It may drill into the shell using its snoot , it may use digestive juices to soften up the shell to separate inwardly , or it may use its suckers and arms to pull the case apart .
8. An octopus may also eat its own.
A hungry grownup octopus is n’t diffident about ingest untried octopi . After all , the smaller creatures ca n’t put up much of a fight .
What ’s more , a study published in the March 2008 variant of Marine and Freshwater Behaviour and Physiology describes a female octopus that attacked , asphyxiate , and drop two days eating a male who ’d just mated with her 13 clock time over a 3.5 - hr period . And you thoughtyoursignificant other was necessitous …
well-chosen holidays , everyone !
