POST YOUR COLOSSAL SQUID QUESTIONS HERE [Archive]

octobot

Apr 17th, 2008, 05:57am

Timaru Herald (http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=T&ct=us/3i-0&fd=R&url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaruherald/4483470a6010.html&cid=0&ei=Bh8HSO_9HoKyyQTSypi6Cg&usg=AFrqEzd6q4epl98smoQWL5H9XEu0tPfUeA)
'Cold case' squid to be star in TV documentary (http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=T&ct=us/3-0&fd=R&url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaruherald/4483470a6010.html&cid=0&ei=Bh8HSO_9HoKyyQTSypi6Cg&usg=AFrqEzcihwsmKl1QejVPveGD1HF-PIY6pQ)
Timaru Herald, New Zealand - 16 hours ago
WHAT A HAUL: Flashback to the moment the colossal squid was landed by the Sanford deep sea vessel San Enterprise as it fished the Antarctic's Ross Sea. ...

More... (http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=T&ct=us/3-0&fd=R&url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaruherald/4483470a6010.html&cid=0&ei=Bh8HSO_9HoKyyQTSypi6Cg&usg=AFrqEzcihwsmKl1QejVPveGD1HF-PIY6pQ)

monty

Apr 17th, 2008, 01:27pm

I think I read that one of the first things you will want to determine is the sex of the animal - do you think if this is a female then it is close to the maximum size and if it turns out to be a boy, how much bigger do you think the female could be? I just also wondered what techniques you might use to help determine the potential size for the species?

I can give a half-baked answer that the sex difference in size will probably be approximated by comparing it to other squid species. This may be a bit tricky, because Mesonychoteuthis is a cranchiid squid, and so it's not that closely related to other large squids. I don't know what the typical size difference is in the cranchiids, but I'm sure that's being taken into account.

The most direct way to estimate the max size, though, will be from beak measurements. Steve's lab has a collection of a whole lot of beaks collected from toothed whale stomachs, and have carefully been measuring the size of the beaks for years. So if one imagines that the beak grows at the same rate as the squid, you can scale the squid to the size of the largest beak they've found. They already did that with the immature 2003 animal, but with this one, they'll start to improve the guesswork on that: it's possible the animal keeps growing after the beak stops growing, or vice-versa, for example. Or just that the squid grows proportionally faster than its beak, or the beak than the squid.

In any case, I'm sure precise measurement of the beak is a priority for Steve & crew to relate it to their wealth of data in this department.

Jean

Apr 17th, 2008, 04:57pm

Tintenfisch

Apr 17th, 2008, 05:12pm

Why is the colossal squid (seems to be anyway) so radically different, morphologically, than the giant squid?

As Jean said, it's actually the giant squid we believe to be more the sit-and-wait type (very small fins, relatively weak mantle musculature, body not strongly attached to mantle - all things that would be problematic for prolonged, fast swimming), while the colossal appears to be a very active swimmer (extremely large fins, very thick, muscular mantle, head fused to the mantle as in all cranchiids (http://tolweb.org/Cranchiidae)).

The giant and colossal squids are in different families (Architeuthidae and Cranchiidae respectively); each family is a group of genera that have certain morphological traits in common, so some of the differences are 'because' they're in different families (or, you could say they're in different families because of some of the differences), e.g. the means by which the head is attached to the mantle. Within the families there can also be a wide range of morphologies - different relative fin-size or arm-length for example. Have a look at some of the cranchiids at the link above - even the eyes vary a lot (and some are very strange (http://tolweb.org/Taonius/19558).) The cranchiids are morphologically quite diverse, so Mesonychoteuthis has some big (ha ha) differences even from other genera in the same family. With Architeuthis, it's hard to say what variations there could be within the family, because at present (according to genetics at least), there is only one genus and species worldwide, Architeuthis dux.

Hope this helps.

:smile:

Jean

Apr 17th, 2008, 05:18pm

Love the C. scabra pic in the puff ball shape :grin:

monty

Apr 17th, 2008, 05:23pm

Yes there will be a relationship of beak rostral (see pic) length to body (usually dorsal mantle) length and weight........however, to create the regression equations you usually need many examples of known size (I used 1100 for N. sloanii). By measuring those beaks and lengths etc you can use Excel or similar to plot beak length against body weight/length and thus calculate an equation. I doubt Steve & Co will be able to do that as they just don't have the available specimens and these relationships are quite species specific. Steve's beak collection won't work because they don't have the size of the original squid eaten by the whale.

J

Sure, but you've gotta admit, two data points works a lot better than one data point: at least then you can judge whether drawing a line of slope beak/mantle from the 2003 animal matches up with beak/mantle for the new one, and if it does then have a bit of confidence about guessing the mantle size from the biggest beak...

Clem

Apr 17th, 2008, 05:26pm

monty

Apr 17th, 2008, 06:26pm

An appeal for questions? Ahhh. This I can do.

1. If the eyes are reasonably intact, I'd be curious to know if Meso, like other cranchiid squid, has eyes that are open to seawater.

2. Does the musculature of the arms terminate at the head, or does it extend all the way to the posterior of the squid's head? To visualize what I'm talking about, flex your fingers up on one hand so that the tendons on the back of the palm stand out. Fingers are arms, palm is head, wrist is posterior of the brachial crown and tendons are (speculative!) muscles. (If you want to go all the way, hold a marble in the web between middle and ring fingers and call it an eye.) If the arm musculature does go all the way to the back of the head, as the tendons in your hand go back to the wrist, does each arm have its own tube of muscle through the head or is the musculature shared?

3. If the internal photophore is present, does it appear large enough to be of any utility, or does it appear rather vestigial?

Thanks. This is all very exciting. I'm on Tintenfisch. I mean tentacularhooks. I mean tenterhooks.

Clem

1. If it's not, it will call into question the whole taxonomy of squids... which would be fine with me :grin:

2. I've been trying to research this sort of thing for my own nefarious purposes, and can say that it is extremely unlikely. Cephs don't really have any tendons at all, and for the most part they don't even rely on connective tissue for leverage; all their muscle action is based on the "muscular hydrostat" principles worked out by Kier. Certainly, there are no cephs that have anything like sheaths that have muscles that slide relative to adjacent muscles... except for the separate organs inside the mantle cavity, they're mostly big masses of muscle with a few non-muscle bits embedded in the muscle, but there's no parts that slide relative to each other...

More than you could ever want to know (almost) can be found at http://www.bio.unc.edu/faculty/kier/lab/publications.html

but Kier has a frustrating habit of describing the arms' and tentacles' cross section, but not what the geometry and innervation of the muscles is like as they merge together at the brachial crown. Why I see this is a frustrating omission is left as an exercise for the reader ( for now. :madsci: ) Particularly since the CAT scan data Steve & crew posted a few years ago doesn't show muscle fiber direction :banghead: )

3. You mean the intraocular photophore many cranchiids have, right? Have you been reading here:
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=117163
?

Clem

Apr 17th, 2008, 06:57pm

2. I've been trying to research this sort of thing for my own nefarious purposes, and can say that it is extremely unlikely. Cephs don't really have any tendons at al

:alarm::alarm::alarm::alarm::alarm:

Monty! No! Gaahhh! That's not what I was saying! I was merely using the appearance of tendons on the back of a human hand to illustrate my (speculative!) musings on the arm musculature, and how those muscles might extend from the buccal plane all the way to the back of the brachial crown, not unlike the configuration of a bullpup rifle. I've attached a pic to show where this notion came from. I've outlined in green the arms IV pair. Now, perhaps it's an accident of debriding and abuse from longliners, but it certainly appears that both arms IV share a connection to a single distinct muscular structure that terminates at the posterior of the brachial crown. My purposes aren't nefarious, but if all the arms are so anchored, I wonder how their actions would impact the eyes, which appear to be nestled between the muscular bases of arms II and III, and what advantage, if any, would be conferred on an animal that could squeeze with its arms and its head.

Now I'll go read those things you linked to.

Clem

Jean

Apr 17th, 2008, 07:13pm

Sure, but you've gotta admit, two data points works a lot better than one data point: at least then you can judge whether drawing a line of slope beak/mantle from the 2003 animal matches up with beak/mantle for the new one, and if it does then have a bit of confidence about guessing the mantle size from the biggest beak...

welllllll marginally, problem is, that often the relationship is not linear, it may be a power curve or some other (mine is a ln relationship)!

j

monty

Apr 17th, 2008, 09:57pm

welllllll marginally, problem is, that often the relationship is not linear, it may be a power curve or some other (mine is a ln relationship)!

j

That's sort of why I said 2 points is a lot better than one point. It's really sort of more than 2 points, because you have (size of 2003) and (size of new) and (beak of 2003) and (beak of new) so you can either plot how the ratio changes as a function of size, in some very limited way, or test if it's also a log relationship by trying it with (log size)/beak or size/(log beak) or (log size)/(log beak), but it could easily be some wacky curve, and having 2 points lets you fit things a bit better than 1. Of course, 3, 10, 100, or 1000 points is a lot better, though... I just think the guess of the size of the one that left the biggest beak starts to get a lot less wild with 2 data points than one, is all...

monty

Apr 17th, 2008, 11:23pm

:alarm::alarm::alarm::alarm::alarm:

Monty! No! Gaahhh! That's not what I was saying! I was merely using the appearance of tendons on the back of a human hand to illustrate my (speculative!) musings on the arm musculature, and how those muscles might extend from the buccal plane all the way to the back of the brachial crown, not unlike the configuration of a bullpup rifle. I've attached a pic to show where this notion came from. I've outlined in green the arms IV pair. Now, perhaps it's an accident of debriding and abuse from longliners, but it certainly appears that both arms IV share a connection to a single distinct muscular structure that terminates at the posterior of the brachial crown. My purposes aren't nefarious, but if all the arms are so anchored, I wonder how their actions would impact the eyes, which appear to be nestled between the muscular bases of arms II and III, and what advantage, if any, would be conferred on an animal that could squeeze with its arms and its head.

Now I'll go read those things you linked to.

Clem

I didn't mean to suggest you thought they had tendons... but I did want to clarify that for other people. I'm starting to get more of what you're saying, though. The hard part is that the arms and the head are mostly muscle, so in some ways where the "arm muscles" end and the "head muscles" start is sort of arbitrary. They don't seem to like to deform their heads as much as their arms, obviously, so I'd think that any extension of arm musculature into the head is primarily to anchor the bases of the arms. I'd expect there to be some sort of support muscles around the brachial crown all the way back, so I'm pretty sure that the head can't be thought of as a bundle of arm muscles held together by connective tissue... but there might well be some arm-muscle-bits mixed in going back quite a distance.

It's also, of course, quite possible that I'm just confused. I've tried to figure this out from diagrams and histology slides for a while, but I haven't seen it well-documented anywhere. JZ Young published some amazing books of histology, but they focus almost entirely on the neuroanatomy, so they don't really address this... in Nixon & Young, in fact, Kier is the only one referenced for arm musculature, except as related to suckers, at least for the loliginid overview (yeah, I know Mesonychoteuthis isn't a loliginid). I've got some xeroxes of JZ Young histology stuff, particularly The Anatomy and Nervous System of Octopus vulgaris, that shows this area in regards to the interbrachial commissure, that's the cross-connection between the nerves going down each arm. There's a 1908 monograph by Joseph Guérin that shows a bit just as the arms enter the brachial crown, that (insofar as my rusty French comprehends) shows that the basic arm muscle profile extends into the head a bit, and then there are some cross-connecting muscles that give some support. He doesn't discuss the eyes at all, though, and neither follows the arms back into the head. It seems, though, that the extension of the arms that go back to form the head are mostly anchors for the arms that are held pretty rigid.

I did find that Nixon & Young show some relevant stuff, but it varies a lot between species, and even among cranchiids... I'll scan some pics and report back.

Jean

Apr 18th, 2008, 12:10am

That's sort of why I said 2 points is a lot better than one point. It's really sort of more than 2 points, because you have (size of 2003) and (size of new) and (beak of 2003) and (beak of new) so you can either plot how the ratio changes as a function of size, in some very limited way, or test if it's also a log relationship by trying it with (log size)/beak or size/(log beak) or (log size)/(log beak), but it could easily be some wacky curve, and having 2 points lets you fit things a bit better than 1. Of course, 3, 10, 100, or 1000 points is a lot better, though... I just think the guess of the size of the one that left the biggest beak starts to get a lot less wild with 2 data points than one, is all...

it's just not that easy unfortunately, here's a fake regression (cos I don't have any real Messie data) and all it tells you is that one is bigger than the other! the pedantic scientist in me just won't allow for any meaningful conclusions to be drawn from this. And you can play with it all you want but you can't predict or draw conclusions from what simply isn't there. What happens in the younger/smaller sizes? Is there an ontogenetic change in growth form, do the older ones reach an asymptote (rare in squid but........), does the growth speed up/slow down?????? and so on, it's very dangerous to extrapolate based on only two sets of measurements!

Argumentatively yours

J

monty

Apr 18th, 2008, 02:49am

it's just not that easy unfortunately, here's a fake regression (cos I don't have any real Messie data) and all it tells you is that one is bigger than the other! the pedantic scientist in me just won't allow for any meaningful conclusions to be drawn from this. And you can play with it all you want but you can't predict or draw conclusions from what simply isn't there. What happens in the younger/smaller sizes? Is there an ontogenetic change in growth form, do the older ones reach an asymptote (rare in squid but........), does the growth speed up/slow down?????? and so on, it's very dangerous to extrapolate based on only two sets of measurements!

Argumentatively yours

J

"Oh, this is abuse. Arguments are down the hall." - Monty (Python):tongue:

Are you arguing that having 2 data points is just as bad as having one? I didn't mean to argue that it would allow a high-confidence guess, just that it's a big improvement over one... mostly, because you can at least estimate how wrong the 1 point approximation is. I entirely concede that it will be a lousy guestimate anyway... but I think we *can* say some fairly reasonable things, like ML is monotonically increasing with beak length, that they won't be wildly uncoupled, and so forth. And since we want one as a function of the other, we can get ML(b) and and an estimate of dML(b)/db for each squid, so there are (kinda) 4 measurements, the value and derivative at each squid's beak size. I think it's not too awful to imagine that both the ML(b) and dML/db are monotonic and kinda smooth over the range, so it's at least possible to fit a curve made of two terms of the Taylor series instead of one. Is this a good estimate? Meh, not really, unless you make a lot of assumptions, but I think they're not completely insane assumptions.

So I put forth that the "best" assumption from one squid with ML=ML0 and b = b0 is:

ML(b - b0) = ML0 + (ML0/b0)(b-b0)

and with 2 squids, with the other having ML=ML1 > ML0 and b=b1 > b0

ML(b - b0) = ML0 + (ML0/b0)(b-b0) +
((ML1/(2b1(b1-b0))) - (ML0/(2b0(b1-b0))))(b-b0)^2

(unless I screwed up the algebra)
which is "better" assuming all the usual Taylor approximation stuff applies.

I did cheat a little, and assume that the line from (0,0) to (b,ML(b)) is a good enough approximation of the derivative, though, too.

Note that "better" doesn't imply "particularly good" but I think the curve is monotonic and pretty smooth and otherwise well-behaved over this range.

It is quite true that this makes some horribly naive assumptions, and whether to use naive assumptions to get an answer or to say "I refuse to endorse and answer that I know is naive so it's probably wrong" is sort of a judgment call... I wouldn't bet my reputation on it, but it's not completely unbelievable. You could possibly do better by assuming some other form rather than a Taylor polynomial, like whatever the log relationship you found in Nototodarus looked like and trying to fit different constants to that, and maybe using (ML1 - ML0) / (b1 - b0) as the derivative estimate for the bigger squid, and stuff like that, too. In fact, I should have done the latter, and as penance I re-solved it:

ML(b - b0) = ML0 + (ML0/b0)(b-b0) +
(((ML1-ML0)/(2(b1-b0)^2)) - (ML0/(2b0(b1-b0))))(b-b0)^2

Of course, this is, in some sense, all completely :tomato: rather than :grad: but people use these sorts of naive models for things all the time. And they sometimes kinda get the right answer, approximately.

And it's not like there are dire consequences for guessing wrong :sink:

p.s. I realized as I was going to sleep that I forgot to correct the ML(b1) value in the 1st deriv equation, on the unlikely chance that anyone is referring to this for some real reason.

monty

Apr 18th, 2008, 02:58am

All pics from Nixon & Young:

A histology slice through Sepia officinalis that shows that the arm musculature does go back to the eyes:
6549

A diagram of the muscles for those eyes, so you can guess how the eye muscles interact with the above:

6550

I don't see the same arm musculature apparently extending into the head in this Mesonychoteuthis picture in an obvious way:

6551

Other cranchiids are weird enough that I wouldn't extrapolate too much from the above, though (although the sepia pics are similar to sepioteuthis, for what that may be worth):

6552

Steve O'Shea

Apr 18th, 2008, 05:28am

Wow. What happened here? I spend a day away and all of this has happened.

Ok, first things first (and the last I'll say tonight).... we will have many more than 2 data points for the beak biomass regression equations. Cat's out of the bag - we'll have ~ 10. Now I shut up; 10 is better than 2; 2 is better than 1.

Apr 18th, 2008, 05:34am

10 :shock:

Steve O'Shea

Apr 18th, 2008, 05:36am

Yup.

tonmo

Apr 18th, 2008, 06:12am

:!: Wow -- that must be history's most concentrated collection of colossal squid.

monty

Apr 18th, 2008, 12:44pm

With 10, there must be at least one eye intact, one would hope :fingerscrossed:

Steve O'Shea

Apr 18th, 2008, 04:59pm

Jean

Apr 20th, 2008, 05:55pm

Jean

Apr 20th, 2008, 05:57pm

Not all are large (as in colossal sized); a number fit into buckets and were preserved at sea. I'll be able to post more information in week or so (I have yet to see them yet).

The best part about this is that they'll not be deformed as a consequence of freezing; the worst part is that I didn't get an opportunity to display them properly - it's hard to know what they'll look like.

Hmmm I wonder if there's an ontogenetic shift in growth, will look forward to hearing about this. Which beak parameters are you using? Just rostral length or are you planning to use hood, crest etc?????

Are you going to age them????????

So many questions!!!!

J

monty

Apr 20th, 2008, 07:00pm

aaaaaaaaaawwwwwwwwwwwwww I was having fun arguing 2 vs 1 :grin:

yes Monty 2 is better than 1 (marginally :grin:) BUT more is always better....'tis the universal plaintive cry of the scientist "MORE DATA....I........NEED.........MORE .........DATA"

And I wouldn't like to try and get a regression based on so few past a journal editor (I've had one tell me my 1100 were too few :mad: fortunately I'm not submitting my paper to that journal!)

J

I wouldn't even try to describe what I propose as a regression, it's just an ad hoc derivative estimate leading to a guess. Still, people who get too fascinated with "the right way to do data analysis" sometimes can't see the forest for the trees.

Continuing the trend from Monty -> Monty Python -> Monty Hall, I wrote up a blog post about an article suggesting that psychologists have been introducing a bias into their results for years, and the embarrassing observation that us computer graphics weenies were doing something analogous for quite a few years, too (but we caught it on our own faster than the psychologists :tongue:):

http://montyy0.livejournal.com/185943.html

Anyway, 1100 seems like a rather high threshold, unless there's some reason to believe that the sampling is horribly biased.

Oh, yeah. This is a humorous take on the perils of data analysis and presentation:

http://www.nbb.cornell.edu/neurobio/land/images/CTC/viz-o-matic.wmv

Jean

Apr 20th, 2008, 07:47pm

too true, The only worry I have with squid remains to size regression with too few data points (be n=1, 2, 10 [sorry Steve]) is that squid growth is so variable between species and even within species that it's very hard to get a "feel" for the growth, with a small sample size and with large "clumps" missing (eg too few adults, too few young un's ). With my 1100 I'm a bit skewed to the younger end and would like more adults but it's not horrifically bad!

j

Steve O'Shea

Apr 20th, 2008, 09:13pm

monty

Apr 20th, 2008, 09:25pm

(the danger is a fishery develops for it, in which case this will be the case).

Hey, that's a question: are they ammoniacal, and hence really awful-tasting calamari rings the size of tractor tires? That would discourage a fishery, I'd think. Mmmm. Windex. (Is Windex a brand of ammonia-based window-cleaner in NZ, or just the U.S.)

Say, are any of the small specimens appropriately sized to stick in an MRI machine?

Jean

Apr 20th, 2008, 10:16pm

Windex. (Is Windex a brand of ammonia-based window-cleaner in NZ, or just the U.S.)

Yes although it's not common.

J

Jean

Apr 20th, 2008, 10:19pm

The one question I have re this larger colossal we'll be examining is what is the LRL. If 45mm or less than I'll quite happily say that Mesonychoteuthis attains weights of 20 tons and lengths of 100 metres .....

Numbers shnumbers .... as long as a little common sense prevails. I certainly don't advocate wholesale slaughter of these animals in Antarctic waters just to build up a regression equation (the danger is a fishery develops for it, in which case this will be the case).

You use LRL more? I've been inclining to URL- mind you that's because in most of the gut contents I've looked at the lower beak has been absolutely minced or is missing, so I concentrated on uppers.

What was the LRL on the smaller one?

I'm certainly not advocating wholesale slaughter no way, but I guess every additional set of measurements you can get may increase the confidence of your regression (BTW I had r squared values of 0.8 or so, so I'm pretty happy with my regression!!!)

J

myopsida

Apr 21st, 2008, 01:50am

Daily events:
http://blog.tepapa.govt.nz/

Tim Stress Eng

Apr 21st, 2008, 08:35am

:sink: What speeds can a squid achieve when propelling itself via the 'syphon'? Are larger squids faster than smaller squids?Can any values be related to the cross sectional area (Size) of the squid concerned i.e. what is the body maximum cross sectional area (a diameter will do)? What is the drag coefficient of a squid in jet propelled mode? I think that it could be quite low as the length to diameter ratio is high (Tentacles trailing) say 1 to 5? I am quessing below 0.01!

Jean

Apr 21st, 2008, 05:53pm

Maybe test in a flume? Otago Phys Ed school has a large flume, which one of the other TF's was using with his class to test drag etc in model fish!

I wonder if a model could be made that has the dynamics of a living, muscular, deformable squid. (thanks Monty....I like this description :smile:) ...some form of silicon maybe? (model makers help!). The fish models were made of plasticine.

We have some small saltwater flumes at the Portobello Marine Lab and I've always wanted to get some baby squid into them (although they are rectangular....I wonder if that shape is still fatal if there is water flowing through it?).

We also do a sinking rate experiment with model plankton (made from polymer clay) in a tall tank, which we fill with water or other fluids at varying viscosities. In this we're trying to get the students think about surface area:volume and surface of resistance. Again the "plankton" did not really approximate the real thing in terms of flexibility and so on.

It would be nice if we could test the squid with something that approximates a living animal!

J

monty

Apr 21st, 2008, 07:03pm

It would certainly be fun to try. It's hard to say what would be the important characteristics to measure, though... the mantle is actively changing size, and presumably the fins and siphon change muscle tension and shape during jetting... maybe silicon with wire or fishing line in it that can have its tension adjusted?

I think Gilly's lab has some sort of tank like that for their metabolism measurements, at least judging from the pictures, but they use live squids...

Jean

Apr 21st, 2008, 07:14pm

A squidroid :grin:

Tim Stress Eng

Apr 22nd, 2008, 07:07am

Re squid speed I will carry out a preliminary 'look see' using naval architecture principals. Regarding my revisiting the scale of the creature I encountered (in reply to the obvious scepticism as to the scale I have described), I have recently checked in the local marina the relative size of the bioluminescent squid-like animal that came under the yacht off the Portuguese coast in the summer of 1994. I climbed on board a similar sized yacht and envisaged the limits of the creature I saw. I was able to align these limits with several marina features.
Here are the values - Mantle 100 feet long plus, plus tentacle length and mantle diameter 35 feet. I think this encounter is living proof that the 100 foot plus squid exists in fact I would stake my professional engineering career on this fact.

I cannot surely be the only man on the planet who has seen this large creature. I am hoping that others will now come forward with their encounter descriptions.

Its vertical ascent gave the impression of great speed towards the sea's surface. For small squid I have seen values of 40 km/hour quoted. Scale this up and what do you get? Drag goes up proportionally with cross section area. I guess that the power goes up proportional with mass - muscle size? Could such a large squid be capable of 80 km/hour or 45 to 50 knots for short bursts. My instantaneous guess from what I saw at the time was it's vertical speed was 50 knots. I can imagine that the squid has a very low drag coefficient (very slippery shape) and being jet propelled is capable of high speeds for short bursts.

To clarify my position: my angle is that of a small yacht sailor who has seen something unusual and not as a knowledgable marine biology scientist; although my wife has worked as a research biologist and I have worked in engineering research so I have some idea of how some areas of research work. I have no vested interest in whether anyone believes me or not and can only say to people this is what I have seen and this is what I think it was (having spent the last year looking part time into the possibility of large sea creatures). I hope this is not just dismissed as 'crank dilusions' and that the possibility that such a large creatures exists is more seriously considered.

Steve O'Shea

Apr 22nd, 2008, 04:03pm

My only concern is that 'large' has to develop from small, so a '100 foot-long' specimen (whether some new species or a very large specimen of some other known species) has to grow from something that's rather small. (Otherwise the parent squid would be several km long.)

I am not aware of any streamlined squid (given you've been talking hydrodynamics) that is known from specimens of immature-to-large-size only (meaning the mature animal is super-sized). Moreover, something of the size you report must (during development) reach a more 'conventional' giant or colossal squid size before attaining sauropod dimension; giant and colossal squid are readily consumed by sperm whales. No 'giant- or colossal-sized beak' of an unknown species of squid is known from the stomach contents of predators such as the sperm whale (or other predators), to support the existence of a beast of the dimensions you propose.

I'd say whatever it was that it wasn't a squid. Sorry.

Tim Stress Eng

Apr 23rd, 2008, 05:00am

It had a squid shaped profile and propelled itseslf with the tentacles trailing. When it headed for the depths the leading end (taper rounded non tentacled end) dropped down untill it was hanginging vertically down with tentacles uppermost. There appeared a swirling of white glowing phosphorescence around the body - I could no longer see the red diamond mesh bioluminscent outline (this vision reminded me of a rocket on a launch pad but upside down) which I subsequently assume was the mantle rythmicly contracting to generate propulsion pressure for the syphon exiting the phosphorescence and generating the swirling glow. It then dispeared accelerating to what appeared to be a great speed travelling vertically downwards from near the surface of the sea off the port bow of the yacht. At no time during this encounter did it break the surface but had the tentacle end nearer the sea's surface (beyond the yachts bow) than the rounded tapered end (beyond and below the yachts stern). I guess it hung at about 20 degrees to the sea surface whilst under the yacht aligned fore and aft with the yachts centreline. I only wish an expert had been on board as a whitness - I am sure that he or she would have been totally amazed at what we encountered that night 30 or 40 miles off the coast of Portugal (I think we may well have been passing over the Nazare Canion). Knowledge is generally based only on what we have encountered. The unknown often comes as a shock and I was certainly very shocked by what I saw that night. I can only repeat that it had many squid-like features in both shape, form and locomotion - thus my conclusion that it was some sort of super sized squid. If not a squid what was it as it was certainly not a whale although for shear size had the scale of a large whale or was even bigger? What else can I say as a layman in these matters!

Tim Stress Eng

Apr 23rd, 2008, 07:35am

Just a further thought Steve, if this animal exists it would be a top end predator feeding on smaller animals such as juvenile or small whale (say around 40 foot long). Surely it would be too large for a Sperm Whale to tackle for food thus no large beaks would ever be found inside whale stomach's. When it dies surely its remains would drop to the bottom of the deep ocean. We would thus never find any evidence such an animal exists by conventional squid study methods. The animals would probably feed during the hours of darkness.Thus I propose that the only way we would know of this animals existance is by a chance encounter. I think that we could possibly attract it to the surface by slapping the surface of the water (simulating the slapping of a whales fins on the sea surface) together with presenting a whale-like profile on the surface of the sea thus simulating what I think occurred off the coast of Portugal in 1994. Shock waves will travel vast distances in water so could be detected from a long distance away.

daviddickinson

Apr 23rd, 2008, 10:29am

I think what Steve was getting at is if it was a new (to science) species of squid, it wouldn't just jump from being small to being super-sized and immune from all other top predators in an instant - it would have "in between" sized growth stages as well where it could be vulnerable to being eaten by the likes of sperm whales (and therefore the beaks would potentially be available for study). I guess maybe it could have some sort of defensive against the normal large squid predators or perhaps it was an exceptional size of "known" squid - speculation of course. You did mention that at first you though it might have been a whale caught in a net, but on closer inspection, it didn't have any whale features?

I am sure the sea hasn't yet given up all of its mysteries and whatever you saw that night, confirms it....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6768821.stm

Tim Stress Eng

Apr 24th, 2008, 01:51pm

Yes the crew pursuaded me that it was a whale which helped my peace of mind at the time - I am now convinced that it was not a whale. Maybe some known species of squid get plentifull food and this turbo-charges their growth and changes them rapidly to the 'super-sized' squid which may also develope different chacteristics to the smaller squid on the way. Maybe this type of squid protects it young? This creature made a decision not to attack and thus possibly displayed reasoned thought. Are squid intelligent? I understand your difficulty but I also find it difficult to understand how I could have seen such a thing.

monty

Apr 24th, 2008, 03:15pm

For reference, Tim's original description is here: http://www.tonmo.com/forums/showthread.php?p=114057#post114057 with further details in following posts.

In addition to the sensible biological objections Steve raises above, it seems to me that the observations are not consistent with any other observation of large cephalopods. The description of the size, behavior, pattern of luminescence, and geographic location are quite different from any sighting of any large cephalopod ever reported. I understand that you very much want to convince people that what you saw was a tremendous squid, but if that were the case, you would likely find things became more consistent with your memories as you discuss this in a forum with experts, while, in fact, you are finding yourself arguing hypothetical ways that this hypothetical giant squid might be different than every other cephalopod ever studied. If it's a squid that's completely unlike every other squid in every way except gross shape and living in the water, why assume it's a squid at all?

As the only eyewitness, if you insist it was a squid for your own personal belief reasons, in the absence of any other evidence, no one can prove anything one way or another, but what you have described is not consistent with any cephalopod supported by any other evidence than your account, so if you're hoping that repeating the story is going to eventually lead to someone giving you an answer you like better, they'd be bucking the trend.

You requested that you not be considered a crackpot, but frankly, coming up with rationalizations to support the conclusion you want to believe in the face of all evidence to the contrary is typical crackpot behavior. Steve is a world-class expert in giant squids (and a number of other cephalopod taxa, and toothed whales, and the ecology of other marine organisms)... I wouldn't say that his opinions are beyond questioning, but suggesting "maybe everything Steve said is completely wrong" should not be done lightly. If your theory about what you saw requires that, I think you need to give some very serious thought to re-evaluating it.

In any case, it was certainly not Mesonychoteuthis hamiltonii based on size, location, and description, so we should probably steer this thread back to discussion of the upcoming thaw of the large specimen of that species... (admittedly, I strayed pretty far off-topic in debating extrapolation of squid size based on beak size, too :oops:)

I'm going to copy the posts from the "squid sucker marks on whales" and this thread related to Tim's eyewitness account into a new thread for discussion there.

The new thread can be found here: http://www.tonmo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13187

I moved the content originally in the "sucker marks on whales" there and copied the relevant posts from here, so that continuity would be maintained here, but please put any further discussion of the topic in the new thread, and ask questions pertaining to the examination of the Te Papa specimen and more generally about Mesonychoteuthis biology here.

Steve O'Shea

Apr 25th, 2008, 04:31am

Thanks Mark. This is greatly appreciated!

monty

Apr 25th, 2008, 02:15pm

Reiterating: please use this thread to discuss questions related to Mesonychoteuthis hamiltonii, the colossal squid.

Anyone wishing to continue discussion of squid sitings near Portugal, or qualifications of the observer, please go to the brand new thread for that separate topic:

http://www.tonmo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13187

thank you.

This thread was created because there are going to be a number of press releases on colossal squids in particular over the next week, so we are expecting that we will be flooded with questions about them, so we decided to provide a forum to deal with that.

monty

Apr 26th, 2008, 06:20pm

There are now 4 live cameras webcasting from Te Papa:

http://www.tepapa.govt.nz/TePapa/English/CollectionsAndResearch/CollectionAreas/NaturalEnvironment/Molluscs/ColossalSquid/

The above has links to 4 cameras and instructions for windows, mac, and linux. I had to install some extra codecs for AMD64 debian linux, but now it works... I'm not sure if there's supposed to be sound or not.

I'm also not sure if watching a squid thaw will be more exciting than watching paint dry, but I expect the crane moving the squid into the bathtub will be fun, and I like the implications of the bolt cutters laid out next to the dissecting table...

dwhatley

Apr 26th, 2008, 07:33pm

Should someone tell Steve that one cure for head lice is to shave your head?

I hope they will turn the sound on as second guessing what is going on and what is where is frustrating. I am assuming that the black box that Steve keeps examining is a chiller? Is the "package" at the left end the squid?

L8 2 RISE

Apr 26th, 2008, 07:42pm

:shock: so is that the squid in the blue tarp on the web cam? :shock: this is so awsome!

dwhatley

Apr 26th, 2008, 07:51pm

If I am correct and Steve's attention to the black box on the right is a chiller and the blue bundle is the squid, it now it looks like they are pushing the squid back into the freezer and bringing ice for the saltwater bath. My guess would be that the water is not cooling well.

Sure hope we get sound

monty

Apr 26th, 2008, 10:01pm

I saw someone waving a plastic squid at the camera, but the image quality is so bad for me that I can't really tell who's who....

After I get back from dinner, I'm going to see if windows or macs look better than linux...

dwhatley

Apr 26th, 2008, 10:17pm

Monty,
Must be your monitor, I am actually pretty impressed with the cam quality and smoothness of motion. Are you watching the wide angle view, it seems to give an idea of what is going on. You should be able to recognize Steve by the glasses, mutton chops and the only one who makes it look like the room is 80 deg F and keeps contemplating the chiller. It seems like they should put another piece of plastic OVER the vat to help keep the cold air IN.

Did you catch Steve sampling the water for the camera - three takes = 3 mouthfuls ;>) but I think one retake was because he could not keep a straight face.

If you go to the disection table now there is a good bird's eye view.

Hummm, I wonder if they are doing some kind of intro for the special since the wide angle camera is now close up focused and you can't see any human activity.

L8 2 RISE

Apr 26th, 2008, 10:26pm

me too, the quality is great, on a lower note.... im starting to get pretty bored... I want squid I want squid I want squid I want squid I want....:bonk::bonk::bonk:

edit: ah.... right on que, so whats the big white blob, and if thats the squid what was the blue block?

monty

Apr 27th, 2008, 02:27am

It's probably that I'm using the wrong CODEC-- I had to install "gstreamer-plugins-bad" to get totem to work on AMD64 linux, so I think the "bad" may refer to the video quality. I'll try the version in my i386 emulation section that can use the windows CODECs and see if that looks better... it was really blocky any time anyone was moving around.

I noticed that the activity was explained on the blog: they realized that the block was more squid than ice, so if they put it in the bathtub now, it would defrost faster than expected, so they're holding off. I guess the "two giant squids" mentioned earlier are 2 juvenile Mesonychoteuthis rather than Architeuthis if I'm reading it correctly... I can't really ID the mantle that's on the table now, but the fins and mantle width make me think it's a small colossal...

ecbaxter

Apr 27th, 2008, 02:53am

re:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7367774.stm

I think you should thaw your Mesonychoteuthis beastie in a preservative bath.

And using a microwave strikes me as a very bad idea.

monty

Apr 27th, 2008, 03:04am

:welcome: to TONMO, ecbaxter.

re:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7367774.stm

I think you should thaw your Mesonychoteuthis beastie in a preservative bath.

And using a microwave strikes me as a very bad idea.

The microwave idea was dropped some time ago, I believe the current plan is to thaw it in low temperature brine, so that it stays cold enough to not rot but is unfrozen all the way through, then (in some order) it will be examined, fixed with formalin, and preserved in an alcohol solution.

Steve's preliminary draft of the process can be seen here:

http://www.tonmo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12974

although they may have modified this somewhat, since it was written some time ago. You might also want to refer to the even older notes Steve made about preserving Architeuthis and other large (but not as large as this specimen) squids:

http://www.tonmo.com/science/public/squidfixingnotes.php

tonmo

Apr 27th, 2008, 06:37am

Octobot is reporting that the thawing has been delayed until Wednesday. Here's the link from the Ceph News Feeds forum.

monty

Apr 27th, 2008, 12:29pm

The blog (http://blog.tepapa.govt.nz/) is reporting (and I added US times):

Sunday 3pm (Sat 8pm Pacific US, 11pm Eastern US): giant squid removal from freezer

Monday morning (Sun Afternoon US): small colossal squid removal from freezer; Monday afternoon at 3pm(Sun 8-11pm US): large colossal squid removal from freezer.

Tuesday morning (Mon Afternoon US): examination of giant squid specimen; afternoon: examination of small colossal specimen.

Wednesday 10 am - 2 pm (Mon 3pm-7pm Pacific, 6pm-10pm East): examination of large colossal specimen; 2 pm fixation of specimens in formalin

I also noticed that I was wrong, and the animal on camera now is Architeuthis, and also that the lectures will not be live, but will be podcast later...