[deathbyfeedback]

giant wasps you idiots. or cthulhu.

[Hip Priest]

Blimey, those squid-of-varying-sizes stories just keep on coming. Here's a good one, but first...

Click here for a video of a jumbo squid feeding, and stuff

And the story:

Published online: 24 July 2007; | doi:10.1038/news070723-2

Jumbo squid invades California

By Ewen Callaway


Mexican fishermen call it diablo rojo — the red devil. A film-maker wears armour when he goes near it. And the Humboldt, or jumbo, squid (Dosidicus gigas) is on the move, swimming north from the tropics and eating its way into commercial fish stocks.

Changing ocean conditions and fewer predators — coupled with the squid's ecological flexibility — are the likeliest reason for the species' expansion, says Bruce Robison, a marine biologist at Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California, who has led a survey of the animal's movements.

Humboldt squid can grow to 50 kilograms and 2 metres. They have more than a thousand barbed suckers to catch their prey and can swim at 43 kilometres per hour.

"They'll eat anything they can catch," Robison says — including each other. "When one member of a group is injured they become lunch for the others."

North to Alaska

Originally, the squid lived only off the Pacific coast of South America. But in the 1970s, Mexican fisherman began to notice the animals further north in the Gulf of California. In the 1990s, California anglers started catching them and the squid has been spotted as far north as Alaska.

To map the animal's migration, Robison and his colleague Lou Zeidberg analysed 16 years of deep-sea video footage captured by unmanned submersibles off the coast of central California.

The videos showed a surge in squid numbers in 1997, an El Niño year when oceans warmed and currents reversed — flowing from south to north. The squid then vanished until 2002, another El Niño year. But this time, they stayed for good.

Each time the Humboldts showed up, hake, the most abundant commercial fish on the West Coast, disappeared from the video footage. Squid stomachs contain lanternfish — their food of choice in Mexico — but hake as well, says Zeidberg. "They can alter their diets based on what's around," he says.

Not picky about its food

The march north can't be explained by warmer water alone, the team concludes. When the Pacific cooled after the 2002 El Niño, the animals stayed and reproduced. And even in the tropics, Humboldts live in cold water 1,000 metres down.

Meanwhile, the squid's predators, such as tuna and shark, have declined.

Bill Gilly, a marine biologist at Stanford University who is leading an effort to tag and track Humboldts, says their flexibility has allowed them to thrive while other more specialist animals fade. "It's likely that this is a common theme over all the world's oceans," he says.

Diver and film-maker Scott Cassell, of Escondido, California, says he has had hundreds of run-ins with the jumbo squid, from curious taps to charging attacks. Once, a squid yanked his arm out of its socket. "My shoulder's never been the same," he says.

[sonicl]

Eeek!


(Just bumpin' this for the sake of all the new kids)

[pbradley]

Giant walking whales? With lice?

 

[floatingslowly]

really? a fucking mutant humpback lobster?? THAT'S the monster?

somebody really should have consulted me prior to the decision.

[touch me i'm sick]

Originally Posted by Danny Himself

Is it me, or are giant squids reminiscient of penises?

that's the first thing that came to my mind.

[pbradley]

nah, the cloverfield monster looks more like this this (spoiler)

like a walking piranha, I suppose

[Danny Himself]

 

This guy, 'Purple Aki', was an urban legend in these parts until his arrest a few years ago proved he was a real person. Akinwale Arobieke. In the 80s he chased one of my dad's friends onto some live railway track.

I AM SCARED OF THIS GIANT MYTHICAL CREATURE.

[Crumb's Crunchy Delights]

Originally Posted by Danny Himself

I AM SCARED OF THIS GIANT MYTHICAL CREATURE.

racist

[floatingslowly]

it's ok danny. they got him. he won't hurt you anymore.


PS: PB - thank fucking gawd.

[Danny Himself]

Originally Posted by floatingslowly

it's ok danny. they got him. he won't hurt you anymore.


PS: PB - thank fucking gawd.

Nahuh, he's been released again:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinwale_Arobieke

[Anngella]

Originally Posted by floatingslowly

 

This made me laugh to the point of tears. Thank you.

[floatingslowly]

 

[noisereductions]

squids are serious jerks.

[SONIC GAIL]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

the
IRS

The scariest!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[noisereductions]

 

half shark/alligator half man

[dirty bunny]

There's nothing scarier than Other.

[joe11121]

giants rats would be fucking scary

[floatingslowly]

 

[Dr. Eugene Felikson]

Originally Posted by Danny Himself

 

This guy, 'Purple Aki', was an urban legend in these parts until his arrest a few years ago proved he was a real person. Akinwale Arobieke. In the 80s he chased one of my dad's friends onto some live railway track.

I AM SCARED OF THIS GIANT MYTHICAL CREATURE.

"During the court case DC Patrick Kilgannon told how "Arobieke became sexually aroused while forcing terrified young men to perform "inverted piggybacks" – ordering them to squat so he could lean over their backs with his face by their buttocks and his genitalia on their necks, while squeezing their quad muscles".[2] During the court case Arobieke made an apology to his victims, and admitted that he was "infamous, notorious, everything from a bogeyman to whatever"."

My god.