NATURE’s takes you into the depths of the ocean to discover the secrets of INCREDIBLE SUCKERS.

The most remarkable life still undiscovered on our planet will certainly be found in the sea. As new machines explore this inner universe and penetrate depths beyond our reach, we are finding creatures — such as cephalopods — that defy our imagination.

Cephalopods are a group of animals that includes the octopus, squid, and cuttlefish. Basically, celphalopods are “sophisticated snails.” But these flamboyant animals have developed huge brains, superb vision, and probably their most obvious feature — sucker disks.

NATURE brings you face-to-face with these denizens of the deep — from cuttlefish to the “vampire squid from hell” in INCREDIBLE SUCKERS.

Online content for Incredible Suckers was originally posted November 1997.

Ocean Planet: In Search of Giant Squid
http://seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov/OCEAN_PLANET/HTML/squid_expedition.html.
An interactive Web exhibit, via the Smithsonian Institution, on Dr. Clyde Roper’s quest for live giant squid.

The Cephalopod Page
http://is.dal.ca/%7Eceph/TCP/index.html.
FAQ and a wealth of information about these creatures.

Cephalopoda
http://tolweb.org/tree?group=Cephalopoda&contgroup=Mollusca
Basic information and references about cephalopods.

Cephalopod International Advisory Council
http://www.nerc-bas.ac.uk/public/mlsd/ciac/index.html.
A cephalopod research group.

Smithsonian Institution Research Information System
www.siris.si.edu/#ceph
A searchable bibliography of secondary sources.

North East Atlantic Squid Stocks
www.abdn.ac.uk/eurosquid/far.htm
A report on squid fishing in the Atlantic ocean.

Kaikoura @ National Geographic
www.nationalgeographic.com/features/97/kaikoura/
A feature on the New Zealand underwater canyon where giant squid are believed to reside.

Books

Doubilet, David. “Beneath the Tasman Sea.” NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, January 1997, 82-100.

Conniff, Richard. “Clyde Roper Can’t Wait to be Attacked by the Giant Squid.” SMITHSONIAN, May 1996, 126-136.

Puente, Maria. “Testing Waters to Learn More about Giant Squid.” USA TODAY, February 1, 1996.

Producer

MARY HOPE GARCIA

Art Director

SABINA DALEY

Designers

KAREN MATTSON

RADIK SHVARTS

Pagebuilding

BRIAN SANTALONE

Writer

KAREN DE SEVE

Production Artist

RUIYAN XU

Technical Director

BRIAN LEE

Thirteen Online is a production of Thirteen/WNET New York’s Kravis Multimedia Education Center in New York City. Anthony Chapman, Director of Interactive & Broadband. Bob Adleman, Business Manager. Carmen DiRienzo, Vice President and Managing Director, Corporate Affairs.

Television Credits

An Oxford Scientific Films Production in association with Thirteen/WNET New York and the BBC

This program was produced by Thirteen/WNET, New York, which is solely responsible for its content.

Just before Roper and his colleagues set out to investigate the mile-deep Kaikoura Canyon near New Zealand, local fishing boats hauled in four giant squid bodies.

After this discovery, they knew that they were on the right track. “It’s a matter of [spending] time in the water,” explains Roper, who compares the search to that for a rare bird in a spacious woodland: “If you spend enough time there, you will eventually see that bird.

Using a robot submersible vehicle equipped with a video camera, the crew recorded hours of footage of underwater life, but no giant squid.

“We’ll be going back to Kaikoura,” says Roper, who is raising funds for a future expedition to track down the giant squid, the creature he calls “the new dinosaur.”

He explained that he needs only a few minutes of giant squid footage to learn a great deal about the animal. “It will tell us about locomotion, and whether it is shy, neutral, or aggressive; if it is solitary or appears in pairs or schools.” His advice to anyone interested in these elusive creatures? “Join the hunt.”

From the ancient Greeks to modern-day writers, people have described giant squid and octopi as “sea monsters” whose masses of arms were able to pull ships underwater. Jules Verne promoted this image in 1861 with his book 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA.

Verne creates a terrifying battle between a giant squid (called a cuttlefish in the story) and Captain Nemo’s submarine. Walt Disney later brought this scene to the big screen in the live-action film of the book.

In 1874, Newfoundland’s Reverend Moses Harvey established the first known public giant squid exhibit. He displayed a specimen caught by a local fisherman to help dispel fears of these beasts from the deep; now seafarers could see what was swimming beneath them.

Even today, we are still fascinated with the idea of enormous sea monsters. In 1996, THE BEAST, a book by Peter Benchley (author of JAWS), was made into a TV miniseries. In the film, a giant squid terrorizes a seaside village, devouring whales and people with equal appetite and confounding local scientists.

But in reality, there is no substantiated record of any person encountering a live giant squid (Architeuthis dux) at sea, and today scientists continue to scan the deep oceanic canyons where it may reside.

Plunging into the ocean world with a deep-sea camera, filmmaker and biologist Mike deGruy brings you face to face with some of the most INCREDIBLE SUCKERS of the ocean: the cephalopoda, or “head-foot.” Octopi, squid, cuttlefish, and other denizens of the deep are shown in their natural habitats, some for the first time ever.

Unlike many other marine species, from bony fish to spiny corals, cephalopods, including squid, octopus, and cuttlefish, have few solid parts. But these invertebrates are far from “spineless” (in the sense of being afraid), as you can see from their aggressive and cunning behaviors on the show. Small squid cleverly disappear into the background and stand their ground as unwitting barracuda pass by, octopi attack their prey from many angles, and the deep sea “vampire squid from hell” displays intimidating rows of spikes on its underside.

While they have a catalog of defensive maneuvers, cephalopods also use their limber bodies to communicate. Dr. John Forsythe, one of the marine biologists featured on the program, points out that cephalopod species can recognize humans much the same way a household pet will identify its owner. Whether or not these behaviors are present in the largest of cephalopods, the giant squid, is yet to be determined.

Little is known about these enormous squid, which cruise at ocean depths greater than one mile. Researchers rely on carcasses found in the stomachs of sperm whales, or washed up on the shore, for the slightest tidbits of information about their diets and habits. Since INCREDIBLE SUCKERS was produced, scientists have embarked on expeditions in search of giant squid, but so far no one has looked one straight in its volleyball-sized eyeball — the largest eye in the animal world.

Dr. Roger Hanlon, who is featured on INCREDIBLE SUCKERS, also studies squid behavior. Hanlon has been following the genealogy of cephalopod populations by fingerprinting the males’ DNA. By comparing the results with those from his studies of mating behavior, he has pieced together a picture of cephalopod courtship rituals and their outcomes.

“It’s a complicated mating system in which males have [to use] a lot of tricks to get near the females,” he says. Not only does the female choose with whom to mate, she can also decide whose sperm to use for fertilization and whose to discard — exactly how, scientists are still trying to determine.

So, unlike in a lion’s lair, where the females mate only with the best fighters, cephalopod mothers choose a father based on other, unknown factors. “They’ve got to get [in] a lot of gene mixing every year, because they die after spawning,” explains Hanlon. Without gene mixing, the next generation will not be as fit to survive and reproduce. As cephalopods become more popular restaurant menu items, especially in Europe and Japan, this diverse mating scheme is an effective way to keep populations stable.

Calamari, or squid, is a favorite in any Italian restaurant, and Japanese sushi and sashimi feature squid and octopus. Just off the coast of Cape Cod is a squid fishery that sells about $40 million worth of squid per year, reports Hanlon. Fishermen have turned to this market now that the famous George’s Bank to the north and the surrounding cod grounds have been fished out. Fish managers suspect that if the fishing volume continues at its current rate, the squid population could soon disappear, but it will be years before biologists have the data to back up this hunch. In the meantime, people throughout the world will continue to slide cephalopods into their mouths.