Secrets of the Deep

Welcome Back D-

https://www.facebook.com/MyFWC
Official site for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Seems like it was a pretty big weekend for mysteries and shenanigans in the ocean. First off, a mysterious eyeball washed ashore on Pompano Beach in Florida.

Described as being "slightly larger than a baseball" when it was found it sparked many theories about it's origins. Some of those tossed about on the Florida Wildlife Conservation Commission's facebook where whale, squid, and my personal favorites "a giant squid ripped out a whale's eye" and the ever popular "Lovecraftian horror."

In the end scientific analysis proved it to be the eye of the Swordfish.

http://tinyurl.com/8s3694r

That wasn't the only creepy thing from the deep. On Friday an Oarfish washed ashore in Cabo San Lucas, in Mexico. A secretive, deep-sea species (between 600 and 3,000 feet) these behemoths lack scales and can reach lengths of 30 feet. With their orange dorsal fins and "manes" many people think that early sightings of Oarfish may have help to form the tales of seamonsters and serpents told by mariners all over the world.

It is thought that this is the first Oarfish to wash up on Cabo's main beach.











Yet none of these is as odd as the tale that came out of France. "A woman was attacked by an octopus while aqua biking." Apparently "aquabiking" is the newest fitness trend, but it nobody expected that the marine life was going to try to get in on the action. The octopus wrapped it's tentacles around the woman's legs, holding her tight to the point that she became unable to escape or continue with the class.

Octopus Street Art in Reims, France

They say that octopod are actually some of the most intelligent creatures of the deep. It's made me reconsider eating them honestly. But then is it right to eat pigs, since they are also highly intelligent? When is a creature too intelligent to eat? It seems like an odd line to draw. 

Q: But would I eat a dolphin? 

A: Maybe. I'm not very nice.

I guess to close up I wanted to show you this video of an octopus stealing a guy's video camera. Maybe all octopi are of the criminal class, so then it's totally ok to eat them.

Wait, that's a bad brand of logic. We can't eat criminals...

Sorry I'm going all Jonathan Swift's Modest Proposal on you this early on a Monday.