Unknown Phylum. Any suggestions?

[sorseress]

None of the photos look exactly right, but I too am leaning toward Tremoctopus. Maybe that's just because I want it to be a ceph!

 

[cuttlegirl]

Ok, the first image is a Mola mola the second image is a sharptail mola. When they are in their larval stage changing into the adult stage, they do not have long fins. The illustration shows a mola at 37 mm long.

 

[GPO87]

Above post: Reminds me of a alien mother ship.

...my bet would be a Tremoctopus, the shape doesn't strike me like a ray, nor a giant man eating jellyfish, sea hare or nudibranch. Some very good analysis work on the photos there.

i liked my man eating jellyfish idea... at the time it was a good suggestion!!!!!

Ok, so I've been following along, and I'd have to agree with Steve... Tremoctopus is just not working... there are no signs of arms, and although the pointy thing could be a mantle... there are no signs of arms! But I also don't think it's any kind of sea hare hm... now I'm stunped. I kinda liked the ray idea, but there is also no sign of a tail or anything, so I dismissed that... as for Mola Mola... I have never seen a striped one!
THEREFORE I HAVE COME TO A NEW CONCLUSION!
... it's an alien... that's the only possible explaination!

 

[cuttlegirl]

as for Mola Mola... I have never seen a striped one!

Neither had I...

Now, keep in mind, I am probably totally wrong on this ID, but in my googling I came across a "Mola mola, seal and dolphin cruise" in South Africa. Also, I know that sea lions will rip off the fins of molas, leaving them finless...

 

[OB]

I see nothing at all on any of the 4 images that looks remotely like a mantle; I see nothing that remotely resembles an arm or a web; I see nothing, other than a smooth skin that remotely resembles a cephalopod; I see absolutely nothing that remotely resembles an opisthobranch either.

Look closer, Steve, the mantle is obvious in the sideways view you posted, imho the eye can even be discerned in the splashy bit, just where it should be in T. violaceus, a bit more ventrally oriented than with most octopus. The arm pair number 2 is actually tucked in like our worldfamous octo heart smiley and webbing is fairly well visible in the zebra striping off the arm pair; witnesses themselves described a wavy motion to that bit, as well as (what I can only interpret as) a mantle swelling and releasing for propulsion. Look at the turbulence in the water, that's jetting. The only thing you seem to be missing here, is the "blanket", which is indeed not always present.

Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate

 

[hallucigenia]

Yeah, I'm with the Tremoctopus people -- the pics convinced me...it really doesn't look like a sea hare to me, and I've never seen any vertebrate that could look like that. Those look like tucked-in arms to me, and I have the independent confirmation of my roommate who came up and asked what kind of octopus it was.

 

[Steve O'Shea]

Before I pass judgement on anything here (as in Tremoctopus or not) I am waiting for additional footage.

If this proves to be Tremoctopus then it has been caught on 'pixel' doing something that it has never been seen to do before. This would be extremely cool, as we will have learnt from this. However, nothing in this pic (or any pic) convinces me that this is any more a cephalopod than an opisthobranch (and some pics are definitely non-cephalopod in nature). Probability (rather than process of elimination) supports this weird thing being Tremoctopus, but I am so extremely uncomfortable wth this. What never ceases to amaze me is how often I am amazed .... that's how cool nature is, I have found my fair share of cool things, and I think it is high time that someone else finds something cool, like something way cool, like something weird, wonderful and bizarre, like something new .... perhaps something completely new.

I so want the next one of these weird things to have an ammonite shell tucked up inside it, and for us to have to completely reappraise what we thought we knew about ammonite morphology, anatomy and behaviour. I am not suggesting that this is an ammonite, not by any stretch of our collective imaginations, but am completely not convinced that it is any more cephalopod than opisthobranch, and if I'm not convinced that it is cephalopod then I most certainly cannot be convinced that it is Tremoctopus.

If this is Tremoctopus then someone tell me what it is doing, how, and why.

 

[OB]

Quick sketch

This is what I'm seeing, anyway...

 

[cuttlegirl]

This thread is sooo cool! I am hoping too that this is something new, it looks so foreign, and of course it would be amazing if it were a new cephalopod. It seems to me that it has more structure than a jellyfish or opisthobranch or even octopus. In Ob's illustration, it seems like there might be some internal (shell??) structure in the middle of the creature.

 

[sorseress]

That's about where coelocanths were discovered, isn't it? Why not some bizarre form of ammonite? (I can dream, can't I?)

 

[cuttlegirl]

What about contacting Professor Charles Griffiths from the University of Capetown, South Africa?

He wrote a book about the marine life of South Africa...

ADDO -- African Dragonflies and Damselflies Online

 

[Michael Blue]

Glad to see this is still going!

Maybe we should all pitch in and fund Steve's mission to go find this critter and positively identify/describe it!

 

[I Love Calamari]

Thank you Mr. O'Shea and everyone for the welcoming comments! I deeply respect your massive knowledge in this field Mr. O'Shea, your time tested ability to identify cephs, and welcome all critique, but in good fun I will plod on stubbornly while always taking your insights into account and reassessing my own.

While I still believe that of all the animals mentioned, Trem seems the most likely to me, I am in complete agreement that it does not totally fit. What the "prehensile" pointy end is, God only knows. The new pictures pointed out by Clem do show a very different specular quality of Trem that is not apparent in the mystery photos. However, I figure we should run through the list of things we know exist, figure which are best fits, then from that group weed out the ones that are incorrect. If all can be proven wrong, then it might be something new.

The sun fish is a good idea, but it lacks anatomical features plainly present in the mystery photos, like the two cephalic water pore-like things on the "head". These could be injuries or parasites, but they would have to be very well placed.

Still running with the ceph notion, if the striped area of the mystery animal is the tentacles (which are striped in Trem) could the tentacles be withdrawn due to the dolphin activity near by? I would imagine dolphins might really enjoy ripping and tearing the tentacles off of an octopus and eating them (much like I would ok, so I wouldn't do it to a living animal out in the ocean, but still...). Therefore, it could be a protective measure to draw them inward instead of displaying itself as bait. I know everyone here need not be reminded, but cephs are amazing contortionists. The one that tucks all but two of its tentacles in and walks on the sea floor is not a far cry from what this creature would be capable of if it were a ceph.

Just to put it out there, I love the unexplained and the mysterious. This is a fantastic post and extremely riveting to be sure. I hope that it is something new, I just want to look at all the possibilities that known animals can present. Nothing like a good mystery to teach you more about what you know, and perhaps, if you're lucky, more about what you had no clue existed.

 

[erich orser]

This is what I'm seeing, anyway...

To be fair to Ob, this is what I have been seeing as well, in fact, since the first vision of pic #4. Frankly it jumped-out at me. Maybe we're wrong. Not sure about trem, but ceph, or at least mollusc - look at some of the wrinkles up close. That could almost be vampy if not for the surface location and markings. Whatever it is, and I dearly desire it to be something brand new, it is definitely something slimy, and that's good enough for me.

 

[CapnNemo]

Maybe it's an octopus mimicing a dolphin by stretching the mantle to create a 'beak' and tucking its arms in to look like a dolphins head sticking out of the water.




...I'll get my coat