Aquarium of the Podcific
Aquarium of the Podcific
Octopuses
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
It's an octopus double feature! This week we have Aquarium of the Pacific's own Brooke Hernandez talking to us about her experience caring for the giant Pacific octopus, and Octonation founder Warren Carlyle discussing his work in creating the world's largest octopus fan club.
TikToks:
Links:
Hi, I'm Aaron Lundie. And I'm Madeline Walton, and this is Aquarium of the Pod Civic. A podcast brought to you by Aquarium of the Pacific, Southern California's largest aquarium.
SPEAKER_03Join us as we learn alongside the experts in animal care, conservation, and more. Welcome back to Aquarium of the Pod Civic. I'm Erin Lundy, Conservation Coordinator for Mammals and Birds, an animal care specialist.
SPEAKER_04And I'm Madeline Walden, the aquarium's digital content and community manager. I'm very excited about this episode. This is our eighth episode, so of course it's going to be about octopuses. Ooh, good idea. I didn't, I just Oh, did you really? I specifically said, like, no, we have to wait until the eighth episode for octopuses. That's funny.
SPEAKER_03I feel really dumb. I literally just got that. Um and I was like, oh, that's such a good coincidence. And then I realized it was not at all.
SPEAKER_04Very particularly planned it. Um, but this episode is really, really great. We hear from two octopus specialists, um, our very own Brooke Hernandez, who's an aquarist here at the Aquarium of the Pacific, and one of our longtime collaborators, Warren Carlyle from Octonation, which is the world's largest octopus online fan club.
SPEAKER_03You know how I can tell you're excited about this episode? Is usually you go, Erin, what are we learning about today? And today you just fully introduce it fully introduced it by yourself. You're like, listen here.
SPEAKER_04I don't have a favorite episode or a favorite animal. I understand. Now I'm really excited about this episode because we get to hear from someone who takes care of our octopuses on site, specifically our giant and pacific octopus, that's Brooke. And then we have Warren, who just loves octopuses and has done so much with his nonprofit to educate the masses on octopuses and how amazing these creatures are. Warren always says, you know, octopuses had a really bad PR for a very long time. And so he's kind of taken over, and I really refer to him as just octopus's PR manager.
SPEAKER_03That's a good title. I wish I could be someone's like an animal species. Oh, okay. I'm Madeline's PR manager. She really likes octopus. Well, I think like I really love that Brooke gives us some perspective on what it's like directly caring for one individual species of octopus because our GPOs have a ton of personality, and apparently each individual is also very different and individualistic. Madeline gets to meet all of them. I get to meet zero of well, that's not true. I think I've met Grindy and Grindy was wonderful.
SPEAKER_04I know. So in this episode, we mention um Grindilo, the giant Pacific octopus, and we recorded this episode at the end of June, and we unfortunately just lost Grindy. Um so we'll refer to her in the episode. Um, you know, octopus lifespans are very short, unfortunately. But they're amazing animals despite their very short lifespan. And I really think that's for humans' benefit because if they lived any longer, they would just take over the world. They're too smart.
SPEAKER_03I'm kind of down. I would kind of say what they did with the world, you know. Like it's your turn. What what you got going on? Um be very slimy. Yeah, and what's your problem? Lot of silly string poop everywhere. I also really liked I liked our conversation with Warren a ton because I didn't know very much about different species of octopus, or and he really is a great PR manager for them because he's giving me stickers, he's talking about how much he loves Octos, and for someone who didn't know as much about them, and Madeline's always been the Octo Super fan, and I've you know kind of just known that they exist but not know too much about them, I fell in love with them just listening to Warren talk about them.
SPEAKER_04But they're they're really amazing creatures. Well, we're gonna get into it. It's a little bit of a longer episode, this one, because we have two interviews, um, but I think they're both very enthralling, so I think our audience will really enjoy it. So let's get into it.
SPEAKER_03So today we have on Brooke Hernandez, who works with our octopus here at the aquarium. Brooke, tell us a little bit about yourself.
SPEAKER_01Hi guys, uh, thank you so much for having me. Uh I work with the giant Pacific octopus here at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. I'm an Aquarist too, and I've been here since July of 2021.
SPEAKER_03That's awesome. And so you have quite a long history with the octopus that we currently have, right? I think her name is Grindy.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Uh Grindelo is our female octopus that we have at the moment. She is 42 pounds and she's been at the aquarium since February of 2022. So she's been here for quite a bit. How did you get started working with octopuses or specifically the giant Pacific octopus? So I kind of have a weird way into the field. It's not super conventional. Uh for me, I didn't know I wanted to do this job. So I in college I actually have my degree in English, and it wasn't until yeah, it's super weird. It's like like brook trivia. Um, yeah, so basically I uh took a scuba course my last semester at Cal State Fullerton. I just needed to eat some units and it sounded fun, and I absolutely fell in love with the ocean.
SPEAKER_04That's so cool. Yeah, so your whole life changed.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, basically, I had a nice job. The college I worked at lined up and I pushed it all aside. My parents were uh very upset. And I took a minimum wage warehouse, like fish house job at the nearest facility that would hire me. So from there, I pretty much was just open to taking whatever animal job opened up. I wasn't picky. I I wanted it to be marine animals, but I wasn't even sure which ones. The kind of mentality I've had in the field is that you don't know if you want to work with something till you do. And there's been a lot of things that surprised me that I thought I wanted to work with, and a lot of things that I realized I did not like working with as much as I thought I would.
SPEAKER_04So it's uh That's a funny realization to have after working. You're like, I don't vibe with this animal.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's that's kind of how it goes. You think you want to work with something. I really thought I wanted to work with sea turtles. That was what like my heart was set on. I was like, yes, sea turtles. And then I worked with them and I loved them. It was your thing. I love them. I prefer the much uh more uh clever animals like the octopus.
SPEAKER_04I think it's so funny that um a lot of our colleagues have degrees in a variety of things.
SPEAKER_03Degree in English, someone has a degree in advertising, you know, yeah, a lot of different paths to this field. And you know, a lot of people come from like, oh, I just volunteered one day and I really liked it, and then I decided I was gonna do this. And for me, I wanted to be a veterinarian and I went a totally different way and went with marine mammals, and now weirdly know a lot about frogs.
SPEAKER_04Like, you know, like nothing is the same thing. Like, you know, you start working with one animal and suddenly you're doing you're working with an animal that you didn't work. It's a frog.
SPEAKER_03Everything goes back to frogs. Everything all roads lead to frogs in my mind.
SPEAKER_04Well, and you can be like a cat person or a dog person, so you can be a sea turtle admirer and not someone who wants to work with sea turtles directly.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. From afar, they're beautiful. We had Adam on.
SPEAKER_03He seems to really love working with our turtles, although he maybe shares some frustrations about maybe them being less clever than some of our other animals. Um perfect. So I'm not I'm not alone in the world. You're not alone, but it really seems like he enjoys taking care of our sea turtles, and it's funny that personality types really seem to gravitate towards specific animals. I don't know how to say this.
SPEAKER_01Sorry, one second.
SPEAKER_03You have a spider under your call. Oh no, I'm so scared. Oh my gosh. I'm so sorry. I want to keep this in the podcast. Oh, the cricket. Oh, it's a cricket. Oh thank goodness. Don't worry, it's just one of my bugs.
SPEAKER_01I saw it and I was like, I can't let her begin it.
SPEAKER_04Because I actually covered in cricket. What happened? I was doing frogs.
SPEAKER_02I thought it was a spider.
SPEAKER_04If you want to work with frogs, you might just carry around crickets in your collar.
SPEAKER_03And no, you I got scared when I thought it was a spider. We have some spiders, you know, like obviously every corner, and I was doing some construction, but it's been a weird day. Um, but I was helping build something in the spider-y part of the aquarium, so I got scared that it was a spider. But uh But a cricket, no problem. Well, the last time I fed my frogs is this morning, so he's probably been riding around with me.
SPEAKER_01I like felt bad because it's like you guys were on a roll and I didn't want to interrupt anybody, but I was like, I'm 99% sure there's a spider on the buddy to crawl over as much as she as much as she wants to be here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's just Oh, that's that's my friend.
SPEAKER_03Oh, that was a cricket. We're fine. Don't worry, he safely escaped into the studio somewhere, so now there's a cricket in here. Okay, that's fine.
SPEAKER_04What if we just hear him in future episodes? Just that would be cute. That's crazy. What's it what we should name him? Brooke, you discovered him. What's his name? Brooke. His name is Brooke. Oh, Brooke Cricket.
SPEAKER_03Every time we hear a cricket, that's Brooke. Hey Brooke, you're being a little loud. We're trying to record something here. Well, it is the funniest thing.
SPEAKER_01No, you were trying to save my life. I mean, I'm relieved it was a cricket because I was just gonna grab it and chuck it.
SPEAKER_04I didn't even see it. Good spot. It was on my neck. I was just staring at you. Yeah. I'm so sorry I lost all of our vote. No, same. No, that was that was amazing. It was a welcome interruption. What I think I was going to say is you were wanting an animal who was a little more challenging, a little more clever. And I think that you probably now work with the most clever, maybe even the most intelligent animal at the aquarium.
SPEAKER_03And very different than anything else. They are their own thing.
SPEAKER_01Yes, definitely. Uh, it's nice because I have an animal that keeps me on my toes, even. There's no two days are the same, no two octopus are the same. We have two right now. Our small one is named Goji. She's just a baby, she's five and a half pounds, and then we have Grindolo, our large lady who's 42 pounds and full grown. And the two of those ladies have completely different personalities. They have completely different relationships with me, they have different likes and dislikes. Every time you work with an octo, it's uh starting from scratch, which I really love. I I love the challenge of it. I love uh the process of trying to build a bond with that animal and get to know that animal and get that animal in turn to know and you know uh like me as well. I prefer when they like me. That's usually the case. It's it's certainly more fun when they like you.
SPEAKER_03So how would you know if an octopus liked you or disliked you?
SPEAKER_01You'd probably be more likely to know if it doesn't like you.
SPEAKER_03It would be clear if it's like.
SPEAKER_02It'd be pretty clear.
SPEAKER_01Stay away from you. And what's honestly the most impressive thing about them is if they don't like you, they have the siphon on the side of their head. So they'll fill that whole mantle of theirs full of water and they will shoot water out of that siphon, and they can go up to 20 miles an hour, and it's like pinpoint accuracy. Like I have seen them like with someone they don't like, hit them in the face and that person run, and the octo continue like doo doo doo just like nail them.
SPEAKER_03So over and over and over again.
SPEAKER_01If they don't like you, they will show you the siphon.
SPEAKER_04That's funny. Okay, but as someone who has been hosed down by an octopus before, I will say maybe it's maybe it's not all only that they don't like someone. There's other reasons that they use it. It sounds like they don't like you in a lot. Yeah. No, absolutely. Absolutely. She was holding my arm while doing that. She was keeping you to do it. She wasn't letting us give it.
SPEAKER_03I don't know what you thought was happening, but I thought we were good.
SPEAKER_01I thought we were friends. It's that big brain energy there. Um, but no, no, they do also use it as an expression of like. I say like big feelings sometimes when they're really excited or they're really mad, or any big feelings, they'll use it. But um, if it if an octopus continues to use it on the same person over and over and over again, that is a sign of dislike.
SPEAKER_03What is that adaptation for? Why do they have those siphons to begin with?
SPEAKER_01So out in the wild, their siphons are used for swimming and getting away from predators. So they'll fill you know their head up with all that water, they'll push it out the siphon 25 miles an hour, and then they'll actually move that siphon between the two sides of their head to help them steer through the water.
SPEAKER_03I didn't know they could do that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's it's pretty rad. Every now and then you'll see um our octo playing with their siphon in the exhibit, too, which is really fun to watch.
SPEAKER_04They're amazing. Huh. I'm learning something new every day. Let's talk about their anatomy a little bit more. So I w I want to hear more definitely about the two octopuses we have and their differences, but I think this is a good time to talk about what is an octopus, what makes an octopus? What's a siphon? What's a siphon? Yeah, all of these.
SPEAKER_03These are not body parts I have, so it's hard for me to imagine some of these things.
SPEAKER_04They um my understanding is that they have three hearts, they have blue blood, they have an ink sac. They have a beak. Um, that sounds like an alien to me. What makes up an octopus?
SPEAKER_01I do definitely feel like they're like the closest thing we have here to extraterrestrials for sure. Um, honestly, what doesn't make up an octopus? They have uh just an array of amazing things about them. I feel like even I've worked with them for years and I feel like I learned something new about them all the time. Um, for starters, they have a beak instead of a mouth, which I think is really cool. So instead of like a shark or a dog with teeth, they're gonna have a beak like a bird, like a parrot would, which is a really creepy, kind of cool fact, especially when you uh take into account that that beak is lined with a neurotoxin. And that neurotoxin causes like uh numbing and then tissue breakdown in their prey. So when they eat, they don't even take bites, they actually use that toxin to break down their prey into like a jelly, and then they slurp it up, which is so creepy, but so cool.
SPEAKER_03I keep learning things about animals. Like every time we do an episode about an animal that I'm really unfamiliar with, like the jellies and the sea stars and the octos, I'm just like, what's happening right now? That's you're making that up. Just make everything into jelly and then drink it. Like that seems wow. So they sort of digest their food out of their body by like biting it and then having it break down those proteins and those things. Yes.
SPEAKER_04That's really pretty similar to some other animals we've been chatting about, like our own.
SPEAKER_03Where they digest externally but differently, but yeah.
SPEAKER_01Do they ever take like bites with their beak or will they just kind of they can, they're fully capable of doing so, and they they can every now and then, but for the most part their digestion is gonna be breaking it down and slurping it up.
SPEAKER_03So do they where obviously the food goes in the beak. Where does the poop come out?
SPEAKER_01So the poop comes out, and that's another uh callback to the siphon. The siphon is super important in the octo. It does a ton of different things. It helps them with breathing, it helps them with steering, it helps them hit keepers they don't like. And it also helps them poop. So the funny part about octopus that people love and don't necessarily always know is that they poop like silly string, basically. It's like a little party in their tank. And what's even cooler from the keeper standpoint is that I can go to another facility and if I see octopus poop, I know what their diet's composed of because the color of their poop is actually really indicative of what they're eating.
SPEAKER_03Oh. What color is our octopus's poop? Sorry if that's personal grindy, but it's time we talk about it.
SPEAKER_01I can look up the chart to see like what it is. Right now they're both pretty gray, and there's a little bit of red in there, so that's usually.
SPEAKER_03What a party. So octopus has a beak, then they bite things, and a neurotoxin comes out of their beak and digests whatever it is that they've bitten. Is that neurotoxin like a paralytic for their prey item?
SPEAKER_01Yes, so it's basically a numbing and a paralytic for their prey item. But that's also why we're very mindful of our hands as keepers, because it would also serve as basically numbing to us, so we might not be able to pair pair that with the fact that the water's, you know, 47 degrees and we lose feeling in our hands pretty fast. We might not actually be able to feel ourselves getting bit, which is why we had to keep an eye on our hands.
SPEAKER_04Definitely. Uh, do does every octopus have that neurotoxin or type of neurotoxin?
SPEAKER_01I know for a fact that all of the giant Pacific octopus do. Um, not super um well covered on other species. Sometimes being the octopus keeper, people are like, oh, what's the common octopus? And I'm like, I've never worked with that one.
SPEAKER_03They're super different too, you know, like two species different version. I know everything about this one. Yeah, this goji one. I got okay. So we've we know about their beak. They have eight tentacles.
SPEAKER_01So they have eight arms, and the difference is gonna be that the arms are basically when you have tentacles, tentacles are used for stinging. So an octopus and arms are non-stinging. So the arms are used for basically grabbing things and they will bring things to their mouth. Or if you're um if you're like a jellyfish or something, you have tentacles because those are stinging.
SPEAKER_03So they have eight arms, they have a neurotoxin-lined beak, they have a big head. What's in their head?
SPEAKER_01Is it a head? So their head is called their mantle, and but it's basically their entire body. So it's a like head in quotations, but really it holds their three hearts, it holds their brain or nine brains, but we can dig into that one in a little bit. Um, it holds liver, their liver, it holds gills, so it's basically their entire body, but it basically is mounted on top of them. So it looks kind of like a head, but it's called a mantle.
SPEAKER_03It's everything. All their organs are contained in the mantle, which is what looks like a head to us. And then they have eight arms that are each individually controlled by sounds like maybe they each get their own brain if they have nine.
SPEAKER_01That's exactly how it is. Each arm gets its own micro brain, and then they all talk to basically the central brain in the mantle. So when they say like each arm looks like it has a mind of its own, it literally does. That's so cool. That's so wild. We love to like take advantage of that too, because we want to keep them enriched and happy. So sometimes when we're feeding them, we'll put a different food item in each arm, and you'll have to see them process each arm separately for like what is this? Do I want it? Do I like it? Do I toss it? You know?
SPEAKER_04Oh my goodness. And then on top of that, their arms are and are covered in those suction cups, which are tasting their food before they even make it to their mouths.
SPEAKER_01Yes, so each arm has about 250 suction cups. The total is right around 2,000 or so on the animal. And each suction cup can individually taste and smell, and it can move about 10 pounds of force each. So you combine those together, they can move unbelievable amounts of weight. Very strong. Strong octoes. Very strong. And additionally, with them being able to taste and smell, it's how they pick what food they want, it's how they tell keepers apart.
SPEAKER_03Um they'll taste you to tell you apart.
SPEAKER_01That's one way they can do it. They also have pretty good eyesight, too. So if you ever look at a giant Pacific octopus's eye, it has like a slit, like a horizontal pupil, and that's because they've actually got on each side a 180 view. So they basically have like nearly a full 360 view at all times. So you cannot sneak up on an octopus. They can see all around them.
SPEAKER_03You should see Aaron's face right now. I'm just, I am processing all age of my arms are telling me different things right now. Do this might be a silly question. Do their arms ever get in like disagreements with one another?
SPEAKER_01No, they all report to the same boss. So they they're like a team, they're like co-workers working together.
SPEAKER_03They're good coworkers that never disagree and all report to the central boss, which is in the mantle. Yes. We're learning. We are all we are learning a lot.
SPEAKER_01It's like a really good cultured team, basically.
SPEAKER_03Good for them, honestly. It's amazing. Wish I had eight arms. We need a good org chart for an octopus and all the arms.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03So each of the suckers are they're called suckers. Yes.
SPEAKER_01On their suckers, suction cups, any of those things.
SPEAKER_03Each suction cup can move about 10 pounds of force. Yes. Does that increase as they age or with the size of the suction cup? Like, does the size of the suction cup mean anything to them?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, definitely. So, like, that's like the average size an octopus can move. I don't think little baby goji's five-pound body is gonna be able to move ten pounds per suction cup. Like lifting a car in the city. She had trouble with her crab this morning that was kind of big. So that's a general fact for the general-sized octopus can move about that much.
SPEAKER_03So we're gonna see goji in there, and she's just lifting things, lifting weights in there. That's crazy. Curling rocks.
SPEAKER_04I love it. So we're at an interesting time, and and by the time this podcast comes out, we'll have released and announced goji. Um, but we have two octopuses, um, one behind the scenes currently and one on exhibit. Um, let's talk about kind of their lifespan and why we would house two octopuses at the same time.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's that's actually the perfect time to have this conversation. They're kind of in a time of like a almost a yin and yang. We're getting the start of one life and then the kind of the the winding down or the end of another. So for starters, we've got Grindolo, our 42-pound female, and she's beginning to show signs of senesse. So senescence in an octopus, what basically happens when an octopus meets uh meets sexual the age of sexual maturity, they will the females will lay eggs, and the males, even if they don't have another octopus to reproduce with, they will begin the end of their life, which is called senescence. So for the ladies, they'll lay eggs and they'll go ahead and guard those eggs for the remainder of their life. They'll start refusing food, they'll refuse play. Their only job is to focus on those eggs and rearing them. And with the males, while they don't have eggs to necessarily cover, they will stop eating, they'll stop interacting, and they'll slowly start kind of decaying is an aggressive word, but it is kind of an aggressive process. So right now, Grindy is in the pre-signs of that. She's still eating really well, she's still interacting really well. By the time this airs, though, that might not be the case. On the other flip side of the coin, we have Goji, who's brand new, you know, five pounds and bright tailed and bushy eyed, ready to see the world, you know. I think I said that wrong. Bright eyed and bushy tailed. There we go. See, I don't work with mammals, so no bushy tails with the act. None for me. But um, she's got her whole life ahead of her.
SPEAKER_04So and speaking of that life, I mean, even with an animal like Grindelo who's so much larger than goji, the lifespan is still relatively short compared to humans or maybe compared to other animals at the aquarium.
SPEAKER_01Oh absolutely. I mean, truthfully they say GPOs live, you know, for between three and five years, but the five years really reserved for those GPOs in really cold Alaskan waters and it's not seen very often. It's truthfully closer to three to four. And if the females are going to be protecting eggs for months on end, you're going to see Senesse right around three. By the time we get the octopus, they're already subadults. So we're lucky if we have them for year, a year and a half, which is kind of a crazy turnover when you consider what an amazing animal they are and how bonded we get.
SPEAKER_04It's hard every time. I've I've been lucky enough to work with Brooke and work with their animals up close too. And it's it is a bummer every single time, you know, but it's kind of like at the same time I think if octopuses lived any longer, I think they would just take over the whole planet. But yeah we care for those animals even though that their lifespans are so much shorter and they are charismatic. They do have you know their own personalities that really shine through um I think of Groot our our one of our past um giant Pacific octopuses who was a really special animal and they're all special but you know I had I feel like I had a good connection with Groot and then Yeah Groot really liked you.
SPEAKER_01No siphon spraying a little bit a little bit big positive feelings.
SPEAKER_04Big big feelings I had big feelings about you too Groot. But to the point where you know when Groot passed I think it's always really important for us to be transparent with our our fan club for our animals when Groot passed we got so much love from our audience it said Groot helped me get through the pandemic. I learned so much about octopuses because of Groot and so these animals are making these huge impacts in their short lives and I just think it's so amazing that we get to be a part of that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah Madeline sent me a TikTok that she she sent me the comments of the TikTok from Groot absolutely wrecked me like at my desk at work like trying not to sob violently.
SPEAKER_04I know they're really really special animals and I'm so lucky to to be a part of telling their story. And I'm excited to continue telling the stories of the animals we have still I think they're absolutely amazing creatures. I don't have a favorite but they're kind of my favorite in the first episode they do say our sea lions are are my favorite but when it comes to the sea lions and invertebrates octopus.
SPEAKER_03Well so we talked a little bit about like when we get them they are subadults and they look like just a little octopus. You know we have a five pound octopus out on our display right now. What is their actual life cycle? Where does it begin? How big are they when they start and what how long do they stay really microscopic is my understanding.
SPEAKER_01So the females will lay their eggs and then um when those eggs are born they will have hundreds of thousands of babies. Wow. They'll have all the babies because the survival rate is like one in a ten thousand one in a hundred thousand like it's great. Not great not great at all because they I mean they start they're smaller than an inch like they're teeny tiny so when you see an octopus like goji that we have here and it's like wow like you made it. Yeah like you're you're you're a fighter.
SPEAKER_04It was a definitely probably a an interesting journey for to get that big my understanding is that they start off super small like that and then you know as they get older and then there's a pretty sudden growth spurt, right? Kind of maybe around the time Goji's at right now. Yeah. Where she is she looks like an octopus she's sizable for an octopus.
SPEAKER_01What do you how big do you expect her to get it's so hard to tell because I've had octopus senesse at 10 pounds and I've had them Senessa at 60 pounds. So they their size like whether it be in human care or the wild is such it's it's so varied. So it's really hard to determine exactly what it would be but yes Goji is currently in the time where she's growing basically 50% her weight every weight. So if she was three pounds last time I weighed her she's almost six now next time I suspect she'll be close to nine like she's in that big growth spurt phase. So I try to basically and I'm I'm kind of working on like a long-term project of um being more consistent about weighing them every month so I can kind of chart out and see like where's the plateau? Where where can I in the future look at our octopus population and be able to say oh based on this growth I think this animal will senesse at this time and then we can do a better job prepping you know the public, prepping us ourselves for the next one and kind of understanding their life cycle a little better as well.
SPEAKER_03So senescence and all of that process is relatively poorly understood in terms of when it will happen for an individual animal and like we don't have a lot of data on that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah there's like kind of like like no way to know like you know when you're getting close your animal's getting big to that age they maybe aren't eating as much they're you know slowing down a bit so you kind of have an idea but every it's so hard to tell. Sometimes you you think it's like this animal should be any day now but it seems fine and then other times like Grindy Grindy caught me a bit off guard. I wasn't expecting her to senesse as soon as she did.
SPEAKER_03And what signs did you start seeing with Grindy that indicated that she was starting to senesse?
SPEAKER_01So a lot of her senesse actually started while I was on vacation. I was gone for two weeks and I came back to like hey your octo has been doing X, Y, and Z. And I'm like, that's just not a normal behavior. Which is why it's so important that um us keepers like make sure we know our animals normal behavior. Because that's the first indication no two Octos are going to sense the same. They're not going to have the same signs. But if you know your animal's normal behavior you will be able to pick apart something that they don't normally do. So basically when they briefed me when I got back from vacation I was like ooh I think something's wrong for her.
SPEAKER_03Yeah that's really interesting to think of like how individualistic their personalities are and even their life cycle can be is there any evidence of um like environmental factors that might encourage senescence like if there's hormonal cues from the opposite sex in the w you know things like that that might there's a lot of theories. I don't think there's a lot of concrete knowledge about it. It's really nice that we have sort of someone like you who's kind of keeping track of all of their life stages and their weights and trying to put together some pattern because I think something that sometimes gets overlooked at zoos and Aquaria is we have this very focused inside look at these animals' lives that we can't really get just by going out and doing research on animals. Because how are you gonna find the same octopus in the ocean again and how are you going to weigh that animal and do all those things. But for you you're able to get weights on the animal understand their growth patterns and maybe look for patterns that could indicate hey we need to do something different for their healthcare or make a change in their management to be good for these animals. And I think that that's a really important part of zoos and aquariums is understanding these animals just a little bit better and getting information we would never get from just trying to find them in their natural habitat. So that's really cool.
SPEAKER_01Yeah we have like an invaluable resource right in front of us that we can learn from and it helps us provide better care for the animals.
SPEAKER_03So it's just like a win-win all around that's really neat do you feel like you develop a very individual relationship with the animals and they get to know you as a person and have a different relationship with you than others?
SPEAKER_01Uh definitely so I've worked in the past where a bunch of keepers share an octopus and I've been part of that and then I've worked where I am now where I am aquarium of the Pacific's giant Pacific octopus keeper which is super cool to be able to say what a title kind of a dream to be honest. Well then they told me I I I hard knew I got the job I was super happy to be a part of a facility like this. Like I can go on and on about this facility. I absolutely love it here. I've worked a lot of places and this place is just incredible. But um anyways I'm gushing but I finished but yeah no I I even in my interview I didn't really mention my giant Pacific octopus experience too much because every facility has like a line out the door for people who want to work with it and I you know wasn't gonna think I didn't think I'd be coming in and you know getting the coolest job in my opinion. And they told me my first day I got the giant Pacific octopus I texted my entire family all my friends I was like I got the octopus I couldn't believe it.
SPEAKER_04It's so well deserved you're so great with the octopuses and it's been really cool to work with you and and work with those animals. It's awesome. You're so um personable for someone who works with an animal that's not necessarily personable.
SPEAKER_01That's really funny because if you asked like most of my friends or family they'd say I'm pretty introverted but like I will nerd out about octopus all day this is the one thing that I'll like come out of my shell and be like do you want to know about octopus?
SPEAKER_03Let me tell you something about an octave.
SPEAKER_01But yeah to circle back to what you were asking me before I went on that tangent about AOP. Basically you were asking about like our relationship with them and all of that. And then there's definitely a learning curve not just with me learning them but them learning me and kind of figuring out likes and dislikes and things because like no octopus are the same like Grindy absolutely loves head rubs. Could rub her head all day long she'll sit there and enjoy it. Groot was like meh he was kind of lukewarm on them. I don't know about Goji yet we're still we're still working on that. So warming up to head rubs. Exactly I I hope so I like when they like head rubs. It's just really cute.
SPEAKER_04It's really cute. Videos of Brooke pet basically petting the octopus like a puppy like not it's very sweet.
SPEAKER_03They're like this is nice little massage. So with that I mean I I'm guessing the octopus are coming up and choosing to interact with you and so I don't know it's nice to see that the animals are able to have so much choice and control in their habitat and their environment and whether or not they're going to participate in the things you might ask them to do. Like how do you weigh an octopus?
SPEAKER_01Yeah uh absolutely it's really nice that they want to be there. That's part of my job learning their likes and dislikes so I make sure that they want to be a part of things. One of those things being basket training so I'll actually basket train the octopus to climb into a laundry basket we'll take it out we'll drain all the water I know it's a silly thought but they just sit in the bottom of a little laundry basket and put them on a scale and that's how we weigh them every month. But we don't want that to be we we want as much of the things that they do to be absolutely voluntary. We want them to not only um do it willingly but also enjoy doing it so we make sure we you know fill it with lots of rewards. If they like tug of war we play tug of war. If they like splash time we play splash time. Whatever they like that's my job to figure out to learn that animal and to make sure that we have those things available to them. And it's super helpful too especially when we do things like TikTok lives uh guest encounters stuff like that nobody wants to see you poke an animal with a stick and be like come over here that's not fun for anybody that's not appropriate for the animal so it's really nice to open those doors and have Grindy come flying over she's so excited to see you.
SPEAKER_02What are we doing?
SPEAKER_04Let's go TikTok here I am and it's I swear they know sometimes I swear they know that they're online.
SPEAKER_01She's so good on TikToks especially but it's so nice too because you you'll even be able to show guests like here I'm handing this animal food so it's not a hungry animal and it like tosses the food away a lot of the times like they don't want the the food or the toys they want the interaction and that's because you know we build on a relationship and make sure that we're giving that animal what it wants every time it comes over. So they're they're very very spoiled here at the Aquarium of the Pacific.
SPEAKER_03It's I think we talked about it in the Sea Otter episode just a little bit about like you can put a handful of shrimp right next to a Sea otter or you can give them enrichment that allows them to practice naturalistic behaviors like put a bunch of shrimp in a toy and freeze it so they have to hit it on a rock forever to get all that food out. And animals so often choose to do the thing that is a naturalistic behavior or is more engaging because yeah they could eat a snack but they could work to get that snack and for some reason sometimes that means so much more to them and is so much more enjoyable.
SPEAKER_01Oh absolutely especially with the octopus I kind of have the mentality of there's no free meals in the wild they would spend so much of their time hunting and foraging and exploring for their meals that I don't I almost never unless I'm working on a training of behavior like basket training I almost never will hand my octoes a piece of food that is boring for them and it takes away an opportunity to really enrich that animal and give them good stimulus. Instead I'll hide it in a Kong, I'll hide it in a puzzle feeder. I mean I have an entire cabinet closet back there. A three-year-old would love it's got Lego blocks it's got jars it's got everything in there. It has everything toy boats you name it we have it for them and we use that. I mean the I believe the AZA standard for the minimum required enrichments for giant Pacific octopus is about three times per week because she's considered an an iconic species and I aim to offer my Octos enrichment uh two to three times per day. So that's awesome they they deserve it they're smart animals. They got nine brains you gotta tire all those brains down. That's a lot of brains. And what's really cool too is that I've noticed when you give those animals more enrichment they become more active and then they're better display animals too so it's like everybody wins.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely I love that let's talk about their exhibit a little bit I think one of the number one questions we get on social media is has your octopus ever escaped? Um is she a troublemaker? Yes she's a troublemaker but the exhibit I know is very secure because um I think in popular culture you know there's been movies about octopuses who just run around an aquarium and that would be really dangerous for the octopus to do. So it may be for us.
SPEAKER_01And honestly for us too I would fear for the fish in my other tank. Yeah absolutely they're smart.
SPEAKER_04Let's talk about those safety requirements with an animal that is so intelligent.
SPEAKER_01What does her habitat look like so uh we definitely pull out all the stops when it comes to the safety of the animals. The first and this is kind of a fun fact that a lot of people don't know and that's that the entire top of the exhibit is lined with astroturf. So that's the one material that octopus cannot stick to for whatever reason.
SPEAKER_03That's so funny. That's such a specific discovery map.
SPEAKER_04Oh we got every material you know what look bring that astroturf over here things did they line up that's so funny.
SPEAKER_03What that's hilarious. So they can't stick I'm assuming it's because their suction cups can't quite get a grip on any one thing. You know it's it's a mystery to us all why that's the one thing. I don't like the way it feels like I really love Astroturf either on my like you know as a tactile sensation. So on my suction cups I don't prefer it cups.
SPEAKER_01It's interesting okay so we have AstroTurf. On top of that so the the display exhibit the one that guests can see from the outside that one has four latches on it that all lock shut so between those two things they're very well kept in there and then are holding behind the scenes if you were to do a guest encounter or whatever you might be able to see that tank that one is screwed down with like metal screws all around the lid and then those are clamped down with clamps on top of that.
SPEAKER_04So go all out all out yeah high security because they can fit through basically anything that is the size of their beak right exactly so like the beak on an animal like goji god I'd think it I it would probably be smaller than a quarter.
SPEAKER_01So any space the size of a quarter or bigger she could get through in her entire body through their whole body through it's so true.
SPEAKER_03What for anyone who's never felt an octopus which it's probably most people if I had to guess what do they feel like to you?
SPEAKER_01Madeline's got the best description for this hands down. I can't beat it.
SPEAKER_03A wet gummy bear okay yeah I buy that I get it and then big wet gummy bear a 42 pound wet gummy bear.
SPEAKER_01Depending on the octopus and its preferred style of play they can be very sticky with their suction cups too. So a lot of times even in the summer I keep long sleeves on because they will leave um we call them octopus kisses but they basically look like a bunch of hickeys all the way up and down my arm. Yep and in public I it will look like I have like chicken pox or some type of disease. Bricks disease. Oh no those are just octopus kisses as a badge of honor. Anytime I walk out of the Habitat I'm just like rolling up my sleeve like yeah look at my bees there's like a handful of them like a little line of them it's cute and it's kind of like look at them. When it's your hole but like when they've covered when I've had two that like tug-a war because that's how that mark ends up there it's tug-awar. So when I have two 40 pound octopus and both of them like tug-awar I end up just covered damaged.
SPEAKER_03Yeah basically and I'm just like this is how you want to play so we call them octopox now and octopox wow that's really fun so they feel like a wet gummy bear they can be sticky or less sticky depending on how they want to engage with you and their skin texture at least can that change in order to camouflage a little bit better or what does their skin texture do? Like I know they can get more wrinkly or less wrinkly.
SPEAKER_01Yes their skin texture is their skin is amazing. So their entire skin is covered in cells called chromatophores and those will basically talk to their brain and decide what color they want to change what texture they want to change and it's super important because like we've kind of been saying this whole time like they're really smart um they're really like big squishy bodies but they have no exoskeleton they have no protection from predators other than their big brain and their camouflage. So they're able to use their brain and their camouflage to basically match their environment they can be as dark of a shade of red as you can think of they can go pale white everything in between all the browns they can also be really smooth if they need to match like a rock surface they can be really rigid if they need to look like algae so they can really display a complete array of colors and textures which is so cool because when you really think about it they are so vulnerable just all by themselves.
SPEAKER_04Yeah they're amazing to see that camouflage in action or even to see that color change when you're feeding an animal and it gets excited so it changes color.
SPEAKER_01That's my favorite part as a keeper they're kind of like a big mood ring. Yes that's a one that's a perfect way to put it we should do octopus mood rings in the gift shop or something.
SPEAKER_03Coming soon to a TikTok near you who love this mood ring. What does this color mean? So what are the different colors mean?
SPEAKER_01So they vary a little bit octopus to octopus but this is one of the ways where they're generally similar so I like the big red flashing the big bright red color that they usually flash when we open the barn doors that is their ready to party color. That is like I'm coming over I'm gonna hang out I'm gonna you know if I'm trying to work I'm gonna steal your tools like they're just yeah they're they're ready and they're there and they're excited. They have this modeled color where they're a little bit red and a little bit white and they have this like really rigid texture and that's usually their thinking cap color.
SPEAKER_03So that's like I give them soaky that's like I give them thinking really hard right now. That's what it is it really is.
SPEAKER_04You know they think hard they have nine brains. Yeah well I I would actually think less if all like I could spread that out over nine brains that would be really nice actually I think it's so concentrated in those nine brains too much thinking oh my goodness in that donut brain just going around and around again. Yeah I always recommend um if you're visiting the aquarium and you see an octopus habitat and you walk by it definitely take a second to really look because you you could just walk past it not even realizing that there's an animal right in front of you. Sometimes literally right in front of your face people will miss it.
SPEAKER_01I am the keeper here and I can't tell you how many times I have been like oh my god did my octopus escape and I know it can't I know it can't but it's always a fear. Literally just today I did it and I was looking in there and I was like where is she and I was like okay she must just be you know in a corner that maybe I can't see from display which is really surprising because on display there's almost nowhere she can hide like there's a 99.9% chance that you can see that octopus and you just don't know it. So I go to the top and I'm like I don't see her here either she was just so well camouflaged behind this little piece of algae that like even me who knows them and like sees them every day so please do put the algae there or put the algae there. Yeah exactly literally design the tank myself I mean when she doesn't tear it apart. So if it's looking a little rough it's her fault this week let's talk a little bit about that. So do you ever dive with the octopuses? Yes so I dive uh the tank water is the coldest in the building it's 47 degrees and it's chilly yeah it's it's cold. It's one of the funnest things to share when you do a guest encounter because people can barely stand to touch the water so they can't even imagine being submerged in it. Fully in it but uh yes what preparation do you have to do to dive a habitat so cold? A lot of really thick wetsuits is kind of and then just a lot of moxy truthfully some deep breaths and there's a lot of angry there's a lot of like you can do this you got this you love your job you love this animal steeply resolved in a thick wetsuit and that's really all in a thing swim hoff breathing your but I will say it uh it it really is a big draw to be able to dive with the animal because if I had to dive that tank and the animal wasn't in there it would just be miserable but like when you get in there the octopus uh generally loves to interact with the diver. Maybe a little too much oh absolutely I've uh I've had I have to bring spare tools because they always love to steal the tools and the second you're like here you have this one they're like oh well I want the one you told me to have it's not good anymore I want that one. Yep they've stripped off white belts um they're really grindy is actually I'm a little bit relieved to not be diving with Grindy any longer. She really had it out for she really wanted the respirator out of my mouth oh we have a video of that on our TikTok we'll link it in the show notes and ideal yep she was like this is the coolest I mean it makes bubbles who doesn't like bubbles she absolutely loved it which is like fine you know it's it's all let her have it but yep I need it to breathe so I have to stop working and then wait for her to get Give it back and I'm just sitting there freezing. So a dive that I could do in like 35-45 minutes takes like an hour and a half when I'm sitting there waiting for Grindy to give my reg back.
SPEAKER_04Is there any danger with diving with an octopus?
SPEAKER_01No. Um and it's so interesting because even when I started here, I had never actually dove with one very other facilities, every facility has very different rules about that. Because they do have a mouth with a beak that could easily penetrate a wetsuit. But for whatever reason, I asked them, whatever reason, they don't bite us while we're in there. And I think it's because they don't view us, we're not a prey item. So while they like to explore the things we have in our hands and our body and our faces, often if they think the suction cut marks on the arm are weird, there's really no way to explain to people why you have suction cut marks on your face. Across your forehead. And during COVID, when we wore masks, I could, you know, cover it, but now I'm just like out in the world with bruises on my face.
SPEAKER_03With the octopus on the face.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's uh when at least there are bruises, it looks like something happened. They get to a point where it just looks like my face is a little dirty.
SPEAKER_04People are like, you're like, nope, that's my octopuses.
SPEAKER_01So it's always an adventure, but um, yeah, they're very curious animals. They come over, they cause a lot of distraction, definitely a lot of ruckus. And no sooner do I go in there and set up the rocks really pretty and make little beautiful algae, this and that, and create a little cave out of this. Do they rip it all apart?
SPEAKER_04That's your version of pretty. She has to live in there and it's her home.
SPEAKER_03She has to redecorate fit, which it's not feng shui enough. Like this sea star goes here. So there are other live animals in their exhibits with them, right? We I know there's been sea stars. There's a really cool looking blue one that's in there right now. But I don't know if it's new. I just took a picture of it today.
SPEAKER_01We have two Stimson stars in there.
SPEAKER_03Stimson stars. It was um crossing its little arms, and I thought it was very cute.
SPEAKER_01Yes, they used to be in our coastal corner touch lab, actually. But they we ended up moving them into GPO to see if they would be better displayed there because they're a really uh unique, rare, cool, starful.
SPEAKER_04I can't wait to see them. I haven't seen them yet.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they're out and about. We have uh the sea cucumbers are in there, they're all out and about today, too. They've been in a great mood lately. We've got um velcro stars, which are exactly as they sound. They basically stick like Velcro, so when I'm in there diving and I try to peel one off my arm, it then gets stuck to my neoprene glove, which I then try to peel it off with my leg and it gets stuck to my neoprene leg. What are they made of of I don't know, but they skin? What is the Velcro star?
SPEAKER_03Why do they do that? Dephoniframe, why not? Yeah, seriously.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they they are unbelievably sticky. I didn't believe it till I actually experienced is it both sides of them or just the bottom that's sticky? It's the whole thing. The whole the whole thing. Because the bottom side has tube feet and the top side has the material that sticks like Velcro. So between those two things, it's just like removing it off one hand right there. I feel it could be so incredibly frustrating.
SPEAKER_03Or like good to see Sarah. But did the octopus ever interact with the other animals that are in their exhibit?
SPEAKER_01Do they So we're definitely very picky about what we put with the octopus. In a perfect world, we'd love her to have lots of tank mates, but she would eat them all because um they are the predators. Yeah, they're they're predators and they're smart and they're fast, and there's not a whole lot that could get away from her. So we definitely keep her with a lot more inverts. She's aware of them, they they share certain um roles with one another, like the anemones like to eat her poop.
SPEAKER_03Symbiosis.
SPEAKER_01Yep, but the stars, whatever food she discards and says, I don't want to eat this today, I don't like my clam, you know, whatever it is she's being picky about, they'll go ahead and clean up off the bottom. So they have a they have a relationship, it's a it's a limited one, but uh in general, octopus, uh giant pacific octopus are solitary animals. They're dead animals, they are much happier alone, they choose to be alone. If we were to try to give, you know, Goji or Grindy a friend, they would kill and eat that friend. Yeah. So they're not um animals that would enjoy a tank mate, they're kind of like an only child bike.
SPEAKER_03Except I heard that Grindy kept a pet crab for quite some time.
SPEAKER_01That was um amazing. So every now and then when we do like kelp runs or things, we end up with kelp crabs on some of our kelp. So there was a kelp crab that was like probably like three inches, a good size for Grindy, something she really should have like devoured immediately. So, you know, we we do have a live crab program here at the Aquarium of the Pacific, and we go ahead and we usually pick up food from a live seafood market and we allow the crabs to hunt it, or sorry, we allow the octopus to hunt it, just like they would in the wild. It's great enrichment. So this kelp crab was gonna be part of that basically. I put him in the tank and pretty much figured the rest was history, Grindy would take care of it, and I noticed it was still in there a couple hours later, and I'm like, this is weird. And fast forward a few months, she never ate that crab. I don't know what it was about that one crab. It was big enough that it should have at least piqued her interest. But for whatever reason, she decided that one was her buddy.
SPEAKER_04And were you giving her other crabs in the meantime that she would eat, or was that kind of like, well, you still have that crab?
SPEAKER_01No, she would still get the weekly, so the ones that we do for our live crab program are um rock crabs and dungeon esque crabs. So we get those from the live seafood market. So she'd still get her weekly crab hunt. She just left the one, and she would eat those other crabs, but she just always left the one. And I mean, she eats multiple days a week.
SPEAKER_02And they were roommates. They really were.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it was the strange I've I've never seen anything quite like that.
SPEAKER_03That's I I'm just so tickled by that. That's so funny. Grindy moved out with Senescence, and she's in our back holding area, and Goji moved in, but the kelp crab still lived in the tank, right? Not for it did for a day or two.
SPEAKER_01Until it didn't. It did until it didn't. So Goji did the natural normal thing that a crab should do when it sees a delicious kelp crab just chilling in the tank and took care of it. So circle of life. Goji got him. Goji got him. I like should have moved the kelp crab with Grindy or something. I didn't really think to. It's just such a weird thing.
SPEAKER_03I've never heard from my roommate recently. It's so weird. I've been worried about kelp crab.
SPEAKER_01Your roommate went to a farm.
SPEAKER_03What do you mean? And Goji's just like like sucking on all the arms. Oh boy. Well, I love that story. That's a really good thing.
SPEAKER_01It's so weird. I've never seen anything like it. I I didn't understand it.
SPEAKER_03Have you heard from Kelpcrab recently? I ate all the other crabs, but Kelpcrab is cool. Well, goji, goji got him. Goji got him.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, goji. Goji, uh, goji's got a a real spunky personality. So when we give Grindy like the live crabs, she takes her sweet time. Everything's done on Grindy's time. So she would take her sweet old time, kind of mosey around, sometimes even like like mess with them a little bit first. And I'm like, oh my god, can you just take care of this?
SPEAKER_03Like, don't be mean, Grindy.
SPEAKER_01Don't be mean, like, be natural. Goji just got her first minus the kelp crab. Her first live. Yes. Minus that one. Um, she got her first live crab feed today since coming to our facility, and she took it down in record time. Wow. She's a pro. Yeah, she's she's got a couple of things.
SPEAKER_04She's like, I already did that other crab. Yeah, this one was gone.
SPEAKER_01Kelp crab, never heard of her.
SPEAKER_04I'm here to do remove crabs.
SPEAKER_03She was not paying rent, so she's been evicted. Oh boy.
SPEAKER_04Oh man, I'm so I'm so tickled by that story. I love it. Do you have any other octopus stories? Are you 10 tickled by the oh there aren't I'm not 10 tickled. That joke doesn't work. I've tried to use it on social media. I'm a real sucker. Haha, that one works.
SPEAKER_03That one works. Um well, speaking of social media, do you want to do we do have some social media questions for you? Um people on Instagram really wanted to talk to someone who takes care of an octopus because it's a really interesting job. And uh one of the questions we got was what's the difference between an octopus and a squid?
SPEAKER_01So we kind of touched base on it a little bit, but um there's gonna be a lot of differences. I my expertise is in giant Pacific octopus and not so much squid, so I can just say that squids have tentacles, tentacles um have stinging components, and um octopus have arms. So that's really the big one. Squid also have a variety of you know, different places they are, different temperatures. I can speak on behalf of the giant Pacific octopus that it's the largest octopus. It is in cold water, and its range is gonna be basically anywhere from like say so cow, kind of loosely. They're out here, but they're not as abundant, all the way up to cold waters of Washington, Alaska, Japan. So that would be uh my expertise on giant Pacific octopus and me kind of dancing around talking about squid. I feed a lot of squid, I don't necessarily work with them. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02That's your cousin, dude. We eat mammals. That's true.
SPEAKER_03I guess I really dropped. But no, don't drop it. It'll be bad.
SPEAKER_04I won't drop it. I won't drop it, Scott.
SPEAKER_03Scott, I'm sorry. Scott, shout out to Scott. Um, do they have other relatives? Cephalopods, what other cephalopods exist that?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so we have a few actually in the building. So I know our SoCal uh gallery that's gonna be opening up. I know that's gonna be featuring a California two-spot octopus. Um, our trop gallery just got a common octopus that has a really great personality and is out and about a lot, so you should definitely check that out.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Cheddar, Common Octopus. We had a crumpet. So fun fact um all of our octopuses are named after the first letter of their species name. So giant Pacific, all G's, common, all C's, two spot D's, uh Day octopus D's.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, the two spot we have now is tortellini.
SPEAKER_04So they're so clever with their names. I love goji as a name, too.
SPEAKER_03What's the cutest octo name that we've had? That we've had that you know of. That I know of come across.
SPEAKER_01Probably the cutest one I think we've had here that I know of is I think Gumball was the one. Gumball. Which is really cute.
SPEAKER_04My first octopus. Gumball was my first octopus.
SPEAKER_01How do you tell the difference between a male and a female octopus? So the way you would tell the difference is if you're facing them to your left side, their right side, the third arm on the right, if it's a female, the suction cups will go all the way to the tip. If it's a male, the suction cups will stop about two inches shy of the tip, and that will be their male reproductive organ, the hectacailus.
SPEAKER_03Hectacautilus? Yes. They got all the fan words for me. It sounds like nautilus. Are nautilus cephalopods? What's a nautilus? Yeah. They're in the cephalopod family. Why do they get a shell? How come nothing else has a shell? I don't know. How do you know that?
SPEAKER_04I didn't make them. But they are really cool nautiluses. So the octopus is related to, we're talking about the squid. Um cuttlefish and nautilus. Cuttlefish are cool. Yeah, cuttlefish are amazing. Um, so speaking of kind of what they're related to, are they a mammal? Are they a fish? Are they a secret third thing? Are they a bird?
SPEAKER_01Are they a bird?
SPEAKER_02They do have a beak.
SPEAKER_01They're technically an invertebrate because they don't have a backbone. But it's so interesting because when you think about invertebrates, mostly they're comprised of things like anemones, sea stars. I don't want to say things of lesser like like knowledge, because like we don't necessarily know all of them. We don't understand you may not understand maybe every facet of a sea star or anemone. Interesting calculus in that. But um, they are part of that family, which is so interesting because they're so evolved and they're so smart, and it's interesting because there's so much um legislation being created for giant Pacific octopus um and octopus in general, because they don't fall under an easy umbrella. It's not a fish, it's not a shark, it's not a you know, invert it is an invertebrate, but it's just so much more than that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Can you tell how old an octopus is by looking at it? Not really. So, like like we were saying earlier, I've had octopus senesse at 10 pounds, I've had them senesse at 60 pounds. The largest one ever recorded was a total anomaly, but it's worth mentioning that it was 600 pounds.
SPEAKER_03600 pounds?
SPEAKER_0130 feet wide.
SPEAKER_03Where did it live?
SPEAKER_01Probably like Alaska or somewhere really cold to live that long.
SPEAKER_02But that is something you said.
SPEAKER_04It's like a well, no, bigger than Parker, the sea lion. I mean, same weight. Parker's 815 pounds right now. Okay, leave him along.
SPEAKER_01He's no winds.
SPEAKER_03He's not 30 feet long. 30 feet? That's so scary.
SPEAKER_01It's worth saying that's a complete outlier.
SPEAKER_03Do you think that was like a mutation, or do you think that maybe they lived to be bigger?
SPEAKER_01Something crazy happened with that one. It's it was a total outlier, but it is worth mentioning.
SPEAKER_03When did this happen? Is it still with us? Did they find it recently within the last 10 years? Are they growing that big out there? Stop bullying, bruh. I'm not bullying, bro. I'm so terrified that there is a 30-foot.
SPEAKER_04It's not gonna show up here. Don't worry, it's not gonna show up in the middle of the night at your house.
SPEAKER_03One of the smartest animals in the entire world. I don't think you're understanding. 600 pounds and 30 feet long. It could probably survive out of water at that, you know, like a dolphin?
SPEAKER_02What is it being? How good is its beak?
SPEAKER_03This is my favorite. Death's toe.
SPEAKER_04You would never really see Aaron's floor.
SPEAKER_03I'm not scared of octopus, but that's you seem scared of unoctopus. Yeah, one. That's too much. I don't need to know about that anymore. Um tell us about their respiratory system.
SPEAKER_01So um because they're invertebrates, they breathe underwater, so they don't come to the surface to breathe or anything. They have gills, and that's basically one of the functions of their heart. So they've got three hearts, and they've got a couple different functions. With those hearts, one's to circulate blood, one's to circulate water over their gills, um, which is really cool that they have so much uh niche anatomy.
SPEAKER_03So the three hearts do different things. So it's one's a water circulation. Like, I know frogs have a lymph heart and then they have like a regular heart. Oh, interesting. So it's interesting. It's funny that like as we're talking about octaves, I'm like, they're a lot like frogs. They have a lot of patients. Shiny seems like it's they're very weird, very niche animals, and now they have multiple hearts. So, man, everything, all roads lead back to frogs. I've never seen a 600-pound, 30-foot-long frog. Not yet. Dude, when they discover that, we are gonna make an episode about it. Where would it live? Alaska. Probably. That's crazy. So they have a lot going on just in their respiratory system in general. Um, someone else wants to know how good are their senses, including their eyesight and their hearing.
SPEAKER_01So their eyesight's pretty good. Uh, we discussed earlier how they have the horizontal pupil that allows them to see basically 360 all around them. There's no sneaking up on them, which is cool. But additionally, they also have a lot of structures in their eyes that are very similar to ours. So that's why they have things like light sensitivity. So that's why even on our octopus tank, we have a please no flash photography. During encounters, we ask for no flash photography, and that's because their eyes are sensitive like ours, and we wouldn't like a flashlight in our eyes either. Um, when it comes to another sense of theirs, I know hearing is one people ask about a lot. They don't necessarily hear like you and I do, but they can feel vibrations so they can feel the vibrations of my voice when I'm baby talking to them. Which is a lot of time. I've had my boss walk back there before and I've been like, oh, sorry I wasn't. She's like baby talking the octopus. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04That's part of that's an important part of their care, okay. She's sensing these vibrations. Yeah. Okay, chill. Good vibrations. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01But uh, so yeah, they don't necessarily hear like we do, but they feel, and that's also why we ask people not to tap on the glass. That's a good practice you should have all around the aquarium. Just you know, being uh good stewards and being good to the animals and being uh good viewers for the animals, but um, they can feel the vibrations as well, too, which is really unique and cool.
SPEAKER_04How long does an octopus stay in one place in the wild? Do they have a home? Do they kind of are they migratory in some way? Are they nomads and they're just going with the flow?
SPEAKER_03Nomads. GPOs specifically.
SPEAKER_01So um for them, there's not really a right or wrong answer. I can speak more generally to it. They're they're not migratory, so you're not gonna have one that starts in Japan and then takes a summer trip to SoCal and then goes back to Japan. Like they don't work like that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, they're not just boarding an airplane with a little safety.
SPEAKER_01A submarine just latches on, goes for a ride. Yeah, no, they're not migratory. Um they basically are gonna pick a home, they're gonna pick a den, and that's gonna be their home for as long as it's safe, as long as it's feasible. So, you know, if they're pushed out by something else, if they feel uncomfortable, they might switch homes, you know, on a weekly basis. If they're chilling and there's no one else around to challenge that territory or make them feel uncomfortable, they could hang out there a few months. And what's really cool is a great way to like find an octopus den. And like if you ever find one, you should never touch in the wild, always like watch at a distance, um, all of those things. But a great way to look for an octopus den is to look for, and this is so morbid, but look for the carcasses of uh crabs and lobsters and yeah, and clams, because they will leave, they'll basically eat their food in their den, and then they'll use their siphon to kick out all the all the extra and the things they don't eat.
SPEAKER_03Do they decorate their homes?
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah, they have been known some some types to decorate a little bit, but it's it's mostly just like getting rid of the shell of the dead animal they ate, basically. It's it's like morbid decorating.
SPEAKER_04It's decor to some people. Yeah, they have oddity shops everywhere.
SPEAKER_03I've seen people who have shells in their house.
SPEAKER_01Kind of like like decorating your house for Halloween all the time. There's skeletons.
SPEAKER_03Just imagining like a little like chicken carcass, like just sitting in a display in my house. Like, yep, I hate that.
SPEAKER_01Except for it would be like on your porch, basically. It'd be like if you open the door and you just chucked it off your porch and like sometimes it hit your porch, other times at the lawn, sometimes it rolled into the street. I love that.
SPEAKER_03Just little dead animals all over, just throwing all my trash out my door. Don't do that. Don't do that. You get a lot away with a lot more. Yeah, the octopus is, you know, they can do what they want. Well, Brooke, this has been a very entertaining episode. I have learned so much about octopus, including things that I'm scared of now. So thank you for introducing. A new fear into my life. I'm not scared of the ocean. Like I've grown up basically in the ocean, but I had never known that there was a 30-foot, 600-pound GPO existing out there when I was in the ocean, and I probably would have gotten out at that point if I knew. But I really appreciate it. And you can get through this airin. I I love shape. We'll be back in the ocean one day. What if um Goji ends up being 600 pounds and 30 feet long? What will we do?
SPEAKER_01We uh we would have to re-home her at about the 100-pound mark.
SPEAKER_03I think that's about the threshold of what we can hold. Goji and like blue clack blue cavern or something, just like the inside cabinet.
SPEAKER_01That actually would probably be the appropriate place for her.
SPEAKER_04That would make my job so easy. Over 500 pounds, I'd be sick. She's just the height of Blue Cavern. She's like, hello.
SPEAKER_01I'll let her know we have big, lofty aspirations for her.
SPEAKER_03Get on that. But um, with all that being said, is there anything you would recommend to anyone listening? How could you help out octopus in their natural habitat?
SPEAKER_01I mean, not to like uh promote our own aquarium, but obviously uh supporting the aquarium, visiting the aquarium, anything like that. We do a ton of conservation work for not just octopus, but all the animals. Um so that's a definite a nice, easy, fun way. You could bring your whole family. We've got awesome things here. It's it's a great facility. Um, additionally, the um there's a lot of resources on our website. I'm not super brushed up on them, but things like um seeing when you get seafood, making sure that you're getting seafood from places where they're following sustainable seafood fishing. That's a big one. You know, we want to make sure we're not depleting the ocean of the animals that things like octopus need to eat. So being responsible in that way. But like I said, there's tons of resources um online. Our new SoCal gallery is gonna be full of information and resources that actually is working towards connecting people to the aquarium and to the ocean. So that's another great place to check out.
SPEAKER_04I thought that's gonna be exciting. I think the octopus is such a great ambassador species to number one, you know, other octopuses in the ocean, but also just the ocean in general. Because I think when you find something out about an octopus, I know that this is true for me for and maybe you today, too. You find one thing out about an octopus and you're like, wait, wait, wait, keep going, tell me more, tell me more. And they're like, This lives out there. Okay, I want to protect our oceans, I want to protect um, you know, octopus's habitats. The fact that this amazing creature is out there and it's you know, it's up to us to take care of its home.
SPEAKER_01Exactly. And I mean, honestly, you don't soon forget meeting an octopus. Even just seeing them move around, they're incredible animals. I'm obviously not biased at all, but they are so special and so unique that they really Do uh serve as ambassadors for not just their species, but the entire ocean.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. Thank you so much, Brooke, for coming on today. This might be one of the longer episodes because I mean, how could we not just talk about octopus?
SPEAKER_01I said I could talk about them all day. Like I just love them so much. But yeah, thank you guys so much for having me.
SPEAKER_03If you guys serve around the aquarium and you see someone diving in the octopus habitat, it's probably Brooke. Wave high if Rindy doesn't have her respirator in her in her arms. Otherwise, Brooke's probably standing breathing at the surface waiting for the respirator to be returned. But um if you see someone around her octopus, it's probably broken she's gonna vibes and kelp crab vibes. Not goji kelp crab vibes, only Grindy Calpography.
SPEAKER_04Awesome. Thanks, Brooke. Yeah, of course.
SPEAKER_01I did hear just a rumor, but the 600-pound one I think ate a couple people named Aaron. But there's just a rumor.
SPEAKER_05Your favorite food is people named Aaron.
SPEAKER_04Hi Warren, thank you so much for joining us on Aquarium of the Pod Civic today. How are you?
SPEAKER_00I'm doing great. So happy to be here.
SPEAKER_04Warren, you are the founder of the world's largest octopus fan club. You're king of the octopus. We're so honored to have you on our podcast today, but we have to know why octopuses.
SPEAKER_00So the story is I went to an aquarium when I was younger, and I'm very neurodivergent. Uh every single time I see something I liked, I made flashcards about it. And I went to the library to like make flashcards about the octopus, and the librarian was like, There's no books here on the octopus. And I was like, Well, that's kind of weird.
SPEAKER_04And so I think a library doesn't have to talk about an octopus.
SPEAKER_00And so then I went to the bigger library, and there were only things that like I couldn't really understand. Like they were like academic, you know, journals and stuff. And so I just remember after that day just thinking, wow, like this is my favorite creature. I had this open loop, I guess. And uh just started to want to learn more and more about it. And so when people asked me, what's your favorite animal? I always say the octopus because there's so much we don't know about them. Like they don't really even have that many books. And that was just the story that I kept saying over and over again.
SPEAKER_04There's so much we don't know about them, but I feel like you're an expert. Yeah. He's like, Yeah, I feel like that too.
SPEAKER_00And I figured out too why uh in 2015, when Sim Montgomery wrote the book The Soul of an Octopus, you know, the first couple pages, she she basically says, You're you're probably wondering why there aren't that many books or aren't they they're not celebrated a lot. And I was like, after I read that, I was like, You're right, they're not. And uh and she's like, they've never really had a good PR agent. And I think that's when I had it in my head that I was just like, oh, that's me.
SPEAKER_04Dream jobs.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, dream jobs, that's a good idea. Octopus PR agent. Put me in coach. Like, I will be the octopus PR agent.
SPEAKER_04I love that so much. Okay, so how did that love for an octopus grow into octoNation?
SPEAKER_00So for those of you who are listening, it's you know, sometimes you look around for things, and I remember for the octopus, I was looking around for something to read, and I never found it. And then finally I was just like, why don't I just write what I want to read? And so I started kind of profiling the octopus as like the superhero of the sea. That they live in every single ocean, they're along every coastline, and depending on where they live, they have like this unique superpower or adaptive ability that allows them to be master of that given environment. And so I started just profiling them and uh in really fun ways, and those posts started taking off and going viral, and and people started telling me this is the first time I've ever seen this species, this is the first time I've ever heard about this you know, superpower or this adaptive trait. And I was like, I think I have something going on here. Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, just good PR. Yeah, good PR, good story. That's amazing. Yeah, no, it's such a fascinating creature, I think, that everyone is immediately drawn to because it's so alien-like. Like we're talking three hearts, a donut-shaped brain, um, you know, eight arms, of course, blue blood. It's got, you know, a beak on top of that.
SPEAKER_00What other what other alien-like one of my favorite things is their eyes. I know I was so captivated when I first saw one that they're so they have such an expression. Um and uh you kind of feel like they're considering you just as much as you're considering it and looking at it. And I remember that first time I was like, it's thinking something in there. It's like there's something going on here.
SPEAKER_04You can see too if you visit the aquarium, and right now we have Goji on exhibit. You can definitely see she'll get a live crab, and we kind of talked about this with Brooke. She grabs that crab and you see her colors change and you see her eyes kind of dart back around, and you see that process thinking they're so intelligent, they're really amazing.
SPEAKER_00And that the those horizontal pupils, I love the fact that they don't really have a blind spot, they can see nearly 360 degrees around their heads. I always tell kids, imagine having like two panoramic cameras on the sides of your head. Like you couldn't sneak up like an octopus. No, it's a door right behind us. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Couldn't you couldn't sneak up on me? I would still. I'd find out. You would you would be able to specifically Aaron would be able to. He'd be amazing at it. Cool, amazing. Okay, so what is your favorite octopus? Is that a hard question to answer?
SPEAKER_00It's a hard question, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Um you can choose like five if you want to.
SPEAKER_00Exactly.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, please.
SPEAKER_00Uh one of my favorites is is kind of like an underdog or under octo species. It's like uh it's called the hairy octopus, and it doesn't have it hasn't been officially described, which means it doesn't have a scientific name. It's just called the hairy octopus. And uh our community has called them like the chub octopus because they have these floating hair-like, they look like a pom-pom ball almost. Yeah. And they look like this pom-pom like puff ball, and they're the size of your fingernail. And tiny. Yeah, right? They're so tiny. Yeah. And then when they move around, they actually utilize like the ocean currents to kind of like just ride an ocean current and then get to the next spot, and then, you know. And they also, their eyes, the chromatophores around their eyes, uh, kind of like they do this sparkling pattern. So it's they're really like hair models. They're like fingernail-sized hair models of the sea, and not that many people know about them. If you Google hairy octopus, you'll see our blog.
SPEAKER_04We're all not donation reading it right now. You're gonna think you're the first one. Do we create SEO?
SPEAKER_05Thanks.
SPEAKER_03Do we have do you guys know what the like hair-like structures are for for catching waves? Does that help with bigger surface area?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so there's again, like there's so much to learn about this species. Um what we know, and like you can see in that profile if you look it up, is from underwater photographers. I mean, they're the ones that are you know out there looking at it, looking at their behaviors and kind of reporting back. And yeah, I imagine it's to kind of like blend in with algae. I mean, they they really do look like a floating like plant matter. You know, they're they're considered the holy grail of octopus finds for underwater photographers. Um and yeah, it's pretty exciting.
SPEAKER_03Looking at that. You would never know that was an octopus from a dead, especially size of a fingernail and so tiny.
SPEAKER_04It looks like a piece of coral, maybe. There's this cool gif on octoNation, too. I'm watching. Is it a video? Is it gifts? It's a gifts.
SPEAKER_03Grow up is the debate we're having right now. Um are they still able to change the texture of their skin the same way that other octopus? Do we not know? Not as much.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, not as much. Um, there's another species called the algae octopus, and that one has pretty remarkable um papilla, uh, which can change the texture of their skin, but they can actually like it, like branches out. It like goes up and then branches out even more. It's like these 3D structures um that really allow it to kind of blend in. And it's funny because they they will have these skin spikes, but also change the color of their skin, and it really does look like like they're just a walking plant.
SPEAKER_05That's pretty. They're so neat.
SPEAKER_00But there's yeah, like I said, there's so many different species. Um as far as another favorite of mine, it's the blanket octopus. So, you know, the female blanket octopus, what's really interesting about her is that she has like this six-foot iridescent cape floating through the ocean, and she spends her whole entire life floating through the open ocean, and when it's time to kind of lay her um eggs, she grows biological stalks from her body. Uh they're like these calci um calcified or calcerous stalks that should grows out, and then she'll kind of braid her eggs into them and then just continue floating along the open ocean until they hatch. You know, as I said, there's so many different stories. Once you get into them and past, you know, the giant Pacific octopus, the common octopus, you're like, wait a minute, what's the next one? What's the next one?
SPEAKER_04Like you think they're weird.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_04They get even weirder. How are these animals being studied? These are deep sea animals, these are animals that are not necessarily you know viewable to just you know regular scuba divers. How are these animals being discovered and studied?
SPEAKER_00I actually wrote a post on that the other day on our Instagram because you know, they haven't been studied all that much. Um to me, they've been on this planet for you know hundreds of millions of years. And so you'd think we'd know a lot more than we know about them right now. Um we just got here. That's true. We just got here. Give us some time to cover. We're a blip on the radar. Uh they're the OGs. But so um there's a small group of, I would say small group of scientists. You know, you have you know Roger Hanlon, you have you know Jennifer Mather, you have um Peter Godfrey Smith, you have, you know, all of these um really well-known people, and they're all out there um studying different um different things as it relates to the octopus. And we have you know Chelsea Bennis, uh the octo girl um with octoNation, and she's doing incredible work with the Atlantic long arm in Florida. Um she did a research where she swabbed um octopus bellies to kind of study their microbiome.
SPEAKER_03Oh, that's interesting. So cute.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because swabbing bellies. Yeah, because you know, octopus is what's really interesting about them is they don't seem to get sick. You know, so you know, they were trying to figure out like what's going on there with their microbiome.
SPEAKER_03How do they do that? Yeah, how are they doing that? What's going on here? That's I mean, for me, everything's related back to frogs, but that's such like a frog thing, too, to have this like very well-developed microbiome on their skin that helps them have immunities to different things that don't necessarily come from like an internal immune system, but are this like colony of bacteria and fungus that live on the skin and help them out. And I was actually reading an article pretty recently about holobionce, which is describing an organism not as an organism, but as a community. And so for you and me, we have gut bacteria, we have all of these things that drive us, and we just don't even think about it. We're like, no, my brain's in charge. Your brain's not in charge. I wanted a croissant this morning, not because I wanted a croissant, but because something inside of me still wanted a croissant, and I had a croissant.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, she did. She had a croissant.
SPEAKER_03The corn was there. So your gut biome was telling you. And I just I love the idea that the biomes are on the same wavelength.
SPEAKER_00There's another uh cephalopod, the bobtail squid. I know this is an octopus episode, but we can talk about it.
SPEAKER_04We can talk about cephalopods.
SPEAKER_00They have this bacteria um that's bioluminescent, the uh Vibri of fisheri, and um it actually helps you know set their circadian like cycle in their rhythm. That's cool. They actually like eject it when into the seabed um during the the daytime so they can sleep, and then it repopulates during the nighttime, and then they kind of just like are like a floating light bulb. So it's like there's all these interesting things happening with with cephalopods. Um and we we feature them all on octonation.
SPEAKER_04I was gonna say, is there room for any other animals on octonace? Is it just octopuses?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we we could cover all of them. We cuddle all of them.
SPEAKER_04We cuddle all of them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so we have cuttlefish, we have uh we even separate, we call them the vampires um because they're their own taxomic group. Um but yeah, Nautilus, uh did I miss any squid? It's pretty much all of them. That's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_03I also love that during this whole interview so far, Madeline's just been furiously looking up pictures of each thing they're talking about.
SPEAKER_00They're also visually uh stunning, yeah.
SPEAKER_04If you are in a place where you can look up the pictures alongside, you absolutely should.
SPEAKER_00If you're driving, do not have Octopedia on our our page too, so we have tons of different photos um of just how they look. I mean, some of them are are really, really stunning.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Octination is such a great resource, definitely recommend checking it out. Um cool. Well, okay, let's talk about what makes an octopus an octopus. What separates it from the other members of the cephalopod family?
SPEAKER_00Um they have really interesting anatomy. So they have um I call their bag of tricks, that mantle that contains like all of their bodily organs. That's a wonderful way to put it. Literally a bag of tricks. It's like I almost think of like a kid running away from home, like throwing, you know, that that stick with a bag. Yep. That's like, think of that. That's like the octopus's mantle, and it contains all of their bodily organs and that one that one thing that floats behind them. So cool. Um, and then they have their eight arms, uh, not tentacles, uh, with bicereal suckers that run to the very uh end of the arm. Um and the way I guess that you could sex an octopus is the the third arm from the right on the male um doesn't actually the suckers don't run to the very end, they uh they kind of stop, and then there's this spoon-like appendage called the hecticotylus. And um, if you're curious, maybe if you if you're if you get to see the giant Pacific octopus on display, you can kind of like point and look at their eyes and then count the third arm from the right and kind of see if you can follow it down to the tip.
SPEAKER_04Really cool to be able to tell the difference. And maybe you know, if you're visiting an aquarium and it's not obvious what sex the animal is on exhibit, you can look for the hectacolus or the left of hectacolus. Is it their right or our right looking at them?
SPEAKER_03That's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00I'm so directionally challenged.
SPEAKER_04So I'm pretty sure it's their right. Their right hand. Right arm side. So right now we have goji and grindy. Um they're both females, so they don't have the hectacolus, those suckers go continue all the way down the arm. But in the past, with animals like Groot, um, we could totally see it. It was really cool. Yes.
SPEAKER_03There's sexual dimorphism in any species of octopus other than the hexacotilus.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. So they're the blanket octopus. Um uh what's really interesting about them is that the male is actually the size of like an acorn. Um they actually yeah.
SPEAKER_03That really tickle me for this fabulous female octopus with her like a ball, she's cute. You've got her little acorn boyfriend over there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I always say it's like an interesting first and last date. He pretty much only exists. Um like his whole entire life is spent kind of developing his um his uh sperm packet to deliver it to her, and then he swims off and he dies. Um but his whole entire life is for the this this his moment, you know, and she uh will collect many you know from from multiple males and kind of decide which one she wants to use to fertilize her eggs.
SPEAKER_04That's so cool. So they can decide which one that's amazing.
SPEAKER_00And there's also the um papernautilus, which is another interesting octopus species.
SPEAKER_04You might hear my ferociously typing in the case.
SPEAKER_00It's also called the Argonaut. And um there recently uh Donna Stoff actually wrote a book called The Lady and the Argonaut. It's an incredible book about um the woman who studied the first ever aquariums. Um but they talked about the uh um the Argonaut papernautilus, and she actually secretes calcite from her arms and grows her own shell. Um and it's not really a shell, it's more of like a an egg casing, and it's specifically for you know to you know guard her babies um while they're in the egg casing. Uh but yeah, it's really interesting. Sometimes males will sneak up into a turn, just like take it for a ride. Um but what's really interesting about that species too is they'll ride atop the the bells of jellyfish. And so we actually wrote a blog called like Should You Pick Up A Jellyfish Hitchhiker? And um and yeah, it's really, really interesting.
SPEAKER_03Do all Nautilus have shells?
SPEAKER_00So the Nautilus is different than a papernautilus. So um it's kind of confusing when it comes to nicknames. Um but papernautilus is an octopus. Yeah, papernautilus is an octopus. Yeah, it's also called an argonaut octopus. I always said that, you know, I always get octonation to kind of like rename, you know, some species because like species like the coconut octopus, um, rarely are they ever in coconuts because I mean that's not like a you know thing in the ocean. Sometimes they roll in there. Um but they're typically there with shells. And prior to being the coconut octopus, when that paper was published, um uh they were called the veined octopus. And so it's kind of fun to um crowdsource names for the community.
SPEAKER_04What else is on your list to rename?
SPEAKER_00Uh the uh the Caribbean Reef octopus, it's it's a beautiful name, but uh that that octopus, if you go to our website too, it looks like Cinderella's dress. Oh, well, obviously she's renamed. Yeah, she has this incredible webbing.
SPEAKER_04Um green. The glass slipper octopus. Yes. Genius!
SPEAKER_00She has this deep webbing, uh, which is interesting because they will go up to a coral and then they'll just it's called the parachute attack, where they'll throw their arms up over the coral and just kind of like blow jets of water and kind of spook prey out uh to eat them. It's just another interesting, you know, behavior of a species that's adapted perfectly for its environment.
SPEAKER_04So cool. Yeah, amazing. Um, have you ever met an octopus before?
SPEAKER_00Yes, um, I've met a couple. I've never actually met one in the wild. I've only ever interacted with them in aquariums. Um but yeah, for a while I was doing uh a series called Interview with an Octopus, where I went to various aquariums all over the world. And uh what was so fascinating was that they all have very different personalities and they have different personalities depending on their life experiences prior to coming into the aquarium. So if they come in and they're immediately shy, might have had a little rough of a life, you know. Uh so it's always interesting to see. Um, I remember I went to the one at Moody Gardens in uh Galveston, and her name was Lola, and it was like whatever Lola wants to Lola gets. She was, yeah, it was one of the most engaging, interactive octopuses um that I've encountered. Uh but yeah, I've also been at Aquarium of the Pacific.
SPEAKER_04I'm not forcing you to say that. I'm just poking you under the table.
SPEAKER_00We actually our most viral video on YouTube is at Aquarium of the Pacific.
SPEAKER_04Oh, you don't say it is. That was a really special day.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we had over a million views on that. It really um really got people interested in which octo was it?
SPEAKER_04Gumball?
SPEAKER_00I want to say, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Gumball. Gumball, I think. That was my first octopus when I started working here. I think it was that long ago. So yeah, I wanted to talk a little bit about kind of our relationship, the aquarium, and octonation. So we've been working together has it been seven years almost? Yeah, it's been a long time. Six or seven years, yeah. And I think it was just serendipitous. When did you so when did you start Octonation again?
SPEAKER_00I started Octonation in 2015.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so about a year later is when I started here. And then we just connected. And you actually helped us name an octopus before. Yes. Yeah, Groot. Yep. He was a very special guy. Um, but Warren actually hosted a was it like a poll or did people comment what they wanted to vote on?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we had I think it was a reel or something like that, and uh and we had hundreds and hundreds of responses from people.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And Groot One, that was a Groot One.
SPEAKER_04And Groot was a very special octopus. He's kind of the was a star on our TikTok channel during um our closure for the pandemic. Um and yeah, I always, you know, I I I love talking about our past animals, but it's always, you know, with like a hint of sadness because they have very short lifespans.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, they do.
SPEAKER_04Why do you think that is? Why do you think they have such short lifespans?
SPEAKER_00I don't know. You know, they've like I said, they've been on this planet for hundreds of millions of years, so maybe like that's the best for the longevity of like their evolution. They figured it out. Um and I apparently that's that's the the best lifespan for them to to survive. Uh it is sad though, because there are most most warm water species uh live less than a year, they don't see their first birthday. So uh it's very interesting. Most people are very surprised when I tell them, you know, especially, you know, um when you get into um aquariums because it's really hard to figure out the age of an octopus. So when you get an octopus, it their size is an indication of how old they are. And so you don't really know what you're getting. Um and so you might get an octopus and it might be two years old, and then you have a year left with it. Um so you never you never really know. Um, like I said, their size and is an indication of how old they are.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So do you know what is the longest lived species of octopus that we know of?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think they discovered uh a species called the muso octopus or the warty octopus. And it was the species that broods over her eggs for four years straight. Oh wow. Did you hear about that species?
SPEAKER_04No, that's crazy. I think they visited one in the ocean for a while and they were monitoring over the course of four years. She hadn't eaten, she hadn't really moved to the side.
SPEAKER_00I would make the assumption, and it's so interesting down there where it's like, you know, uh life is just maybe it's more slower paced or cold water.
SPEAKER_04That water is so cold water just keeps you, keeps you younger.
SPEAKER_00Metabolism, I guess so. But yeah, I I I want to say that that's probably the oldest, one of the oldest living.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's fascinating. So octopuses enter no matter what, a stage in their life called senescence, where they begin to decline. And that happens typically in the ocean after breeding, correct? But in an aquarium setting where we're not breeding animals, that happens no matter what. Yeah. It's kind of like a trigger that goes off in the animal. It's just it's time. Yeah. Is it a hormonal thing? Do you do we know?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, they they said that there's a hormone that's released. It's essentially, I've heard it described so many different ways, where it's like cellular suicide, or it's like, you know, um, they just go into this, you know, I explain it like Demential or Alzheimer's like state where they just forget they're like they they think they're changing colors but they're not like they're fully exposed and then they get eaten. Or they start doing things like swimming up into the water column where they whereas they wouldn't normally do that. Um so you can always kind of tell. Um uh they start getting kind of lesions on their body too. Um so yeah.
SPEAKER_04It just happens no matter what. It doesn't matter. And they coil.
SPEAKER_00What I've what I've noticed too is uh a big thing is that the tips of their arms, like really like almost like corkscrew. Um and we've learned that a lot from like our group members. Um some of them are hobbyists, and they say that it like it's like a very triggering thing for them to see the corkscrew arms because that means like they're reaching the end.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, pretty close to time. Yeah, it's it's definitely a bummer that their lifespans are so short, but I do think that if they lived any longer, they'd probably just take over the world.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, probably which like I'm kind of down for bring it on. Yeah, like what is the evolutionary advantage for having your life be so short? I like I truly some pressure must be put on them to only live a certain amount of time, but they're crazy animals in that you can tell that every second of their life they are learning something new and then applying those concepts, probably better than I ever have in my whole life. And they have such a limited time that it seems like they're crazy intelligent just to kind of advance as much as they can. But you just gotta wonder what does it mean, like why three years down the line.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you can really see the that learning through observation with the coconut octopus because um it'll just walk along the seafloor, like it's called stilt walking, where they'll just get up and they'll start walking along the seafloor and they'll start collecting things like you know, um different shells, and then they'll figure out how to like use it to like almost like a jigsaw puzzle to cover their body so that none of their like squishy bits are are like vulnerable or anything like that. And then they kind of go into their kind of predator-proof bunker and uh just hold those those things close to them. It's uh it's pretty interesting.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and they have you know only a couple months to figure that out. Yeah. And and you know, live their life. Uh huh. It's amazing. Isn't that very cool?
SPEAKER_03I just it's like incredible to think about, but also like they're related to other mollusks, supposedly, right? Like slugs and snails are supposed to be relatives of them, and those don't seem like particularly intelligent animals, and so you wonder how did this group go so far away? And maybe snails are really smart, maybe just don't know about it.
SPEAKER_00There's actually a really good book um by Donna Stoff called Marox of the Sea, where she kind of breaks down the history of that. If you're interested more into that, I I suggest that book. She did a really good job um kind of breaking that down. And uh Peter Godfrey Smith, uh Other Minds, he breaks down it's a very phil philosophical look at exploring consciousness in the an octopus. It's another interesting book.
SPEAKER_03But they're primarily pretty solitary species, right? Like our most species of octopus exist solitarily. Yeah. And so they're not even learning behavior from other octopus. It's not observed behavior from you know conspecifics, and they're like, okay, cool, that's how you do it. They just figure it all out on their own, which is the weirdest part to me. But are there animals or octopus species that live in more of a community, or is that not really an octopus thing?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so they did interesting uh research uh into octopolis and oclantis, which is like uh they're I want to go there. What do you go to there? You go like if they have footage from there and they're just throwing shells at each other and they're blasting each other with debris. So they're cohabitating, but they're not doing it in a way that's friendly. Yeah, they're not happy about it. Um so they but they live in close proximity to one another. But like I said, if you see some of those those photos and we have a blog on it too, they're like blasting each other with sentiment. Sentiment, they are hurling shells at each other, and um but yeah, for the most part, they are pretty solitary creatures.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah. That reminded me, there is there an octopus that's able to remove its hectacautilus and throw it at a female? So there's there's a lot of memes, yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's like but I you know I wouldn't say that I I hate to be the person that goes, well, actually, you know, when you No, that's what you're here for.
SPEAKER_04We're here to well actually the octopus community.
SPEAKER_00It's it's there's uh a species, um, and it's the Argonaut, right? So the the paper notes the female that has the shell. There's again another go back to sexual dimorphism, that species as well has a very tiny male. And so his, like I said, his whole entire life is dedicated to him developing that sperm packet that he f finally delivers to the female. And so that arm is like pretty long and it has its own type of sucker or like appendage, like um uh to where it can almost crawl. Or like once it detaches it, it it's still moving and can't. It's like a lizard tail. Yeah, it's it can crawl into like the right area into the mantle so that then it'll just kind of like Aliens. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Aliens so wild.
SPEAKER_00And so it's like, okay, I know where to go.
SPEAKER_03I'm so glad that's not a people thing. That's the scariest thing I've ever heard.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's it's really interesting. Um that is cool.
SPEAKER_03So that's the same paper nautilist, the Argonaut.
SPEAKER_04I can't wait to learn more about that. I I don't think I've ever looked into that creature before. It's fascinating.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Amazing. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_00The Lady of the Argonaut, like I said, is another book by Donna Stuff. I keep bringing her up, but she's been writing a lot of good books lately. She's she's crushing it.
SPEAKER_04That's awesome. Um, cool. Okay, so this is probably a question you get all the time. What is the most correct term for plural octopus? Octopi, octopodes, octopuses, just singular octopus.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it's octopuses. And when people ask, I'm just like, octopus is a Greek word, so it wouldn't take a Latin plural ending. And that's kind of where I end it. Um people tell me they just they just they still don't like, they're like, I just like the word octopi. I'm like, okay, you can like it.
SPEAKER_04It's not you can like whatever you want, you're just wrong.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm just like, you know. And so they're like, well, you know, they're like, well, it's it's correct now. And like, well, yeah, many things have been put in the dictionary afterwards because of widespread misusage. But you know, what side do you want to be on?
SPEAKER_02Do you want to be right?
SPEAKER_04If you want to be wrong, stay wrong. That's fine. The dictionary will kiss it.
SPEAKER_00It's actually fun to say like the correct Greek pluralization, which is octopodies.
SPEAKER_03Octopodes. Because the pus part is foot, and so then it's multiple foot in the way you would do it.
SPEAKER_00I've heard it pronounced all sorts of different octopodes, octo some people say octopods, but I don't know.
SPEAKER_03Octopuses. But we're going with octopuses. We're going with octopuses. Because octoonation says so.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you'll never see octopi in any research. So, like, I've never actually seen it written in any like sort of scientific paper.
SPEAKER_02No scientist would ever call that. Well, there you go. Scientists at home listening to this crosses out the word octopi in the paper that they're writing.
SPEAKER_03But no real scientist would ever do that.
SPEAKER_04Oh, that's amazing. All right, well, what's the most intriguing thing you've ever learned about octopuses? I know that's kind of a hard question to answer.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, one of the most intriguing things is the fact that, you know, most people know that octopuses have suckers, right? Um, but those suckers taste and they smell and um they can grip objects, right? And another th another thing that's interesting about them is very similar to kind of like how we have fingernails. An octopus on each one of their suckers has this like chitinous cuticle. Um and when they want to improve their grip on things or improve their taste, um, they can actually start like rubbing their suckers. It's like this molting process. And then all these kind of like lily pads um uh like of skin are kind of floating through. And so I always tell people that octopuses give themselves manicures. You know, they kind of that's how they kind of broom themselves, is they kind of just like will rub their arms together as almost like they're concocting this evil plan. And what they're doing is that they're just improving their like grip on objects, on substrates, um, they're improving their sense of of taste and smell. So it's pretty interesting.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. When that happens too, they get extra slimy because they're you know shedding that layer of skin.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Um it's fun to see that.
SPEAKER_00If you if you're ever at the aquarium when that happens, it's a treat because you're like, what is it doing?
SPEAKER_03Party. Just imagine shedding all your fingernails so you can touch things better. Like, what a I'll do it. I'll try it. I'll try anything right now. Kind of along the same vein of that question, what is the most interesting behavior that you know of that octopus display? Any species?
SPEAKER_00Any species. Hmm. I would say that uh the mimic octopus is really interesting just because they still kind of haven't figured out how they have this w repertoire of mimicking certain animals, like the banded um uh sea snake or the flatfish. Um they actually will morph their bodies into what that species looks like and even undulate like the like that flatfish and just kind of like go through the water as if they're that that species. And it's like, how are they like how do they know how to do that?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I wonder if it's observing or if they're just kind of built in, because like we're saying, they don't have a lot of time to observe and to practice their mime capabilities.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and there's like a lot of you know, people making the assumption they're like, is it innate, is it learned, is it a combination of of both? You know, but they seem to be mimicking like uh in certain environments, like the banded sea snake, when that specific, you know, uh specific animals are around. So they don't just do it all the time. It's like they observe their environment and mimic whatever makes the most sense for them in that time. But there are other, like um, one of the coolest things that I know about cuttlefish is that they actually uh did research that they have embryonic learning. So prior to even hatching, they're learning about their environment uh outside of their egg casing. So they actually are developing preference for food even prior to hatching based on looking and observing its environment. And they can actually decide to hatch early if there's like this chemical signaling where like other uh cuttlefishes are hatching and say there's a predator in there, they can like just abort like and just go like go out of there.
SPEAKER_04Time to be born now. Time to be born.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you've seen them, they have them here uh in the babies exhibit at Aquarium of the Pacific, but they they're so tiny and they hatch as literally miniature adults, like perfect replicas, just tiny.
SPEAKER_04They're really cool. Octonation has a lot of great videos of octopus eggs or cephalopod eggs, and you can see their little eyes moving around in there. It's it's amazing.
SPEAKER_00They're like little Christmas lights too, because they're actually practicing their chromatophores. Those um they'll change colors.
SPEAKER_03They will.
SPEAKER_00It looks like Christmas lights, you know, and they're then then they're and sometimes it looks like they're moving together or they're like learning from each other. Wow. It's really fun to watch.
SPEAKER_04I'm red. You're moving too now. That's so cool. What's the gestational period of an octopus typically in an egg? How long does it usually take?
SPEAKER_00Um I would say that it depends on the species. Everything with octopus, when people say, What's the I'm like, okay, well it's different on every single species. Yeah. Um but uh warm water species.
SPEAKER_03Four years for that one. Yeah, four years for that one.
SPEAKER_00I mean, warm water species. Um you're looking at a couple months. Um colder water, like the giant Pacific octopus, take you know, a couple months. So it's pretty interesting. Yeah. Each one of them.
SPEAKER_04Fascinating. Is there an evolutionary reason to why they have exactly eight arms? Do you think?
SPEAKER_00I'm not too sure. Yeah. That's a great one. So specific. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Eight eight specific arms. And all of them have eight, eight, eight arms.
SPEAKER_00And they're bilaterally symmetrical, which means they're a mirror image on both sides, too. I'm not too sure.
SPEAKER_04Fascinating. Is there any recent science or developments that you're really excited about when it comes to octopuses?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I've been watching that octopolis. I just think it's hilarious.
SPEAKER_03I want to watch that. I want to watch that experience.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, anytime you know new research comes out, it's just it's really interesting. Um, viral headlines of of things going around. And when the uh the octopuses throwing things at each other started happening, I think they they do things sometimes that are like seemingly relatable to us. And so I think initially in the study, they were like females throw things at males that harass them. I think that was like one of the headlines. And that like went off, and then they're like, no, that's actually that that area is just heavily dominated by females, but males and females are throwing things at each other at like at an equal rate. But yeah, so um, but yeah, there's just so much, so much cool research happening right now. I'm trying to think of more, but that's all I can think of right now that I'm interested in.
SPEAKER_04Awesome. That's so cool. So, what does OctoNation have in the future coming up? What do you hope to do over the next couple years with uh the largest octopus fan club?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so what we really a win for us is obviously people knowing about all the different species and getting interested in um kind of like finding their way and mapping their wonder to the ocean through the lens of an octopus. Because we really feel like if you can initially have this central focus and fall in love with something in it, you can like anchor your love for the ocean through something that you're just like, oh, we have to protect it because my favorite animal lives in it. And I feel like that's a more sustainable way to develop a relationship with the ocean than showing massive pollution or widespread you know mistreatment of animals or all these different things. And so we like truly inspire Wonder of the Ocean by educating the world about octopuses, and we'll never kind of backhandedly say, well, if you love the ocean, then you would do XYZ. And so we're we're staying in the educational lane and just like I said, talking about certain behaviors and things, making them as relatable as possible, so that when people go out there in the world, um, and you've you've seen all of our merch, like we have so much really cool illustrative merch, um, that they can like sh like I don't know, show off their merch and then also educate about the species, and then you know, I don't know, just go forth and uh and get people interested in the ocean. I feel like we have to come up with new and unique ways to get people interested in the ocean. Obviously, social media is a really cool way to get kids interested. Absolutely. Um, so it's just kind of re thinking of different campaigns, like uh, you know that we do interview with an octopus, but we want to kind of like bring back interview with an octopus, but with a celebrity. There's so many opportunities to just introduce, and by introducing, you know, somebody to the octopus, you're introducing their audience to the octopus. And so it's just a really cool way to think about um, you know, how can you uh show the wonder of the octopus to somebody because they are fascinating, even when you're interacting with them, you're so it's so surprising how strong their suckers are. And um, you just what I found is that when people meet them for the first time, it's like a life-changing thing.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely, right?
SPEAKER_00And so um just trying to think of more campaigns. We have some interesting work coming out with National Geographic this next year, so look out for that. That's exciting. Um and some work with again this book of world records. Um there's a lot of really cool documentaries coming out um that are profiling individual species. So uh look for their stories to be told on the big screen pretty soon.
SPEAKER_03I know you just said that you don't backhandedly slip in a conservation message with the octopus. But for our listeners who really do want to help out octopus, what is your one overarching way that people can help animals out in the ocean?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I would say that first educate yourself just about like them and get really interested. Um, and then kind of um see what organizations um have volunteer opportunities. Uh I was just asking you know, Madeline, what's the what does the volunteer um look like here at Ocrame of the Pacific? And they said that there's an incredible program here, right? Yeah, there is. Right? And so there's there's all these opportunities. You have to kind of have to figure out like, you know, what is what is your interest? And it's okay to like have this singular focus and go in and say, you know, what can I do? Is there an opportunity to intern for social media just as it relates to an animal? Is there like how can you make your mark in in your own unique way? For me, I found out you know that it was being the PR agent for the octopus. But but for other people, they might want to do, I don't know, like Cuttlefish Nation, or they might want to do it.
SPEAKER_04You actually recommended it because I told you the first time we met, like I love octopuses, of course, but cuttlefish kind of have my heart. You're like, you should start Cuttlefish Nation. I'm like, I got enough going on. But Cuddle Nation. Cuddle Nation. I think that could be a subsection of Octonation, combination.
SPEAKER_00It's just finding your own unique, you know, flair when it comes to conservation and really figuring out what really inspires you, because the fact of the matter is when you're more inspired, it's infectious. And and people, it'll rub off. I know that for me, when I when I'm talking about the octopus to people, they always tell me they're like, I just love how lit up you are about.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, you really, you really do.
SPEAKER_00And by like you lighting up, it just makes me it's good like I've never heard octopus in, you know, in in like this length of time. They're like, I'll I'll definitely consider it more. And I think that's at the end of the day, if you if we can get people to consider the ocean more, then we have a chance at at saving it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, your enthusiasm is contagious. Like, I am so excited about octopus. I'm like, I'm gonna go look up every species of octopus. And I really feel like that's really the heart of conservation work is making people care about things and showing how much you care about something and telling them why you care about it, and just being excited is the best way to get people to fall in love with the different animals, the ocean. And at the aquarium, we have different volunteer opportunities. There's you can volunteer with our education department, and you can be the one on the floor telling people about these amazing animals. We even have volunteers, which are really cute to see these like really young teenagers talking very excitedly and way more knowledgeably about some of the animals and knowing things I don't even know. So there's a lot of opportunity there. And I think just make your mark in whatever way feels right for you, and that's really great advice.
SPEAKER_04We were walking around the aquarium before we started recording, and we ran into Diana, who's a charter volunteer, and she was just gushing about the octopus, and I was like, I work here, Diana, like to put this on it. And she's like, No, I'm so happy that I'm up here and I get the chance today to be in front of the octopus habitat. It was really special. Yeah. And you know, it wasn't even just because Warren was there. She was a little genuine. She was like, Warren's here. I love it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but just I guess learning about all the different species and learning about their like for me, it was just like, wow, these these animals have been on this planet for hundreds of millions of years. Like they've they've survived through mass extinctive events on this planet. You know, for the longest time, when I was growing up, I saw there was a lot of emphasis and focus on animals that were going extinct. And I always thought, like, it's really interesting to me that the octopus represents to me adaptability, resiliency, like problem solving. It's like maybe like, why don't we focus in on an animal that has stood the test of time and really learn from how they've figured it out? And what's interesting to me is just like how they figured it out in every single environment on planet Earth, like underwater. So like the Antarctic octopus has anti-freeze proteins in its skin that allow it to survive in like sub-zero temperatures. You have a hot water volcano octopus that lives next to you know underwater hydrothermal vents, like 200-degree plumes of toxic, gaseous, you know, where seawater meets magma, and they're just happy, you know, down there. You know, it's just like you, so everywhere you go, it's just like you you run into an animal that's like just figured it out. And I think that there's something to be said about you know just the wonder that is the ocean. It's like you have all these things that literally have figured it out. Um, and to me, that's that was just fascinating.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's amazing. Oh, what are we gonna do together next? We're gonna do more interviews with an octopus. Yeah. Let's do it. Interview with the code. You gotta meet goji.
SPEAKER_00Have to meet goji. Yeah. Yes.
SPEAKER_04Warren, where can we find you?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so you can find us at if you go to octopusfanclub.com, that's our Facebook group. But we're just Octonation on every single social media platform.
SPEAKER_04Thank you, Warren, so much. This was so much fun. Thanks for coming down to the Aquarium of the Pacific to talk to us on Aquarium of the Podcific today.
SPEAKER_00Thank you.
SPEAKER_04Aquarium of the Podcific is brought to you by Aquarium of the Pacific, a 501c3 nonprofit organization. In 2023, the Aquarium celebrates 25 years of connecting millions of people worldwide to the beauty and wonder of our ocean planet. Head to aquariumofpacific.org to learn more about our 25th anniversary celebration. Keep up with the Aquarium on social media at Aquarium Pacific on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
SPEAKER_03This podcast is produced by Aaron Lundie, Madeline Walden, and Scott Shaw. Our music is by Andrew Reitzma, and our podcast art is by Brandi Kenney. Special thanks to Cecile Fisher, Anita Viez, and our audiovisual and education departments, and to all of our amazing podcast guests for taking time out of their day to talk about the important work that they do. Podcific wouldn't be possible without the support of the aquarium's donors, members, guests, and supporters. Thanks for listening.
Podcasts we love
Check out these other fine podcasts recommended by us, not an algorithm.
The Podcast Aquatic
Tennessee Aquarium
Amazing Wildlife: A San Diego Zoo Podcast
iHeartPodcasts