CMAS: HUFFARD

FEBRUARY 18: CHRISTINE HUFFARD ON CEPHALOPODS Dr. Christine Huffard gave a fascinating talk to CMAS on the biology and behavior of cephalopods. She is an expert on octos and presented information that is not yet in the literature as well as correcting common misperceptions. Fig 1) Crissy lecturing Fig. 2) Crissy with Doug Lehman Crissy began by assuring us that ìoctopusesî is the correct plural of octopus rather than octopi. She also detailed the previously unknown sexual reproduction in octopuses. In some species males have only five sperm packets to use throughout their whole lives. To make careful use of this valued resource, an arm is used to insert sperm directly in the female near the egg. Afterwards, they follow female, keeping in touch with an extended arm. Males fight, with the largest always winning, probably by restricting water intake (breathing) of the smaller male. She showed video clips of the fights. The action was fast and furious with 16 arms to watch. In spite of the attention by the male, he eventually looses track of the female. This often happens in a rising tide, because it is not a reliable time for both to come out of their holes. She also presented an intriguing video she shot of bipedal locomotion in octopuses. She speculated this behavior is used for escape. Predators may have evolved to recognize the normal jetting locomotion of cephalopods, and thus may not recognize a walking octopus. Details of her work were recently published in Science. Crissy said she received so much attention from the media that it delayed completion of her thesis by about a month. See Video or Huffard Finally Crissy warned about the difficulties in keeping octopuses in home aquaria. They can escape from any hole greater than two times their beak size. They have the largest brain-to-body mass of any invertebrate so they are good escape artists. Furthermore, the capture methods used for collecting many species are damaging to the reefs. When captured in the wild, the octopuses generally live in an aquarium for less than 2 months. She did say the tank raised species, Octopus bimaculoides, are a good choice for the aquarium. Before purchasing one contact Nancy King on tonmo.com. Crissy and other CMAS members attended a dinner Friday night at Tom Sandercockís house. There was lotís of chance to talk to Crissy and view Tomís aquariums. Photos from Huffardís web site. Christine recently received her Ph.D. from the Department of Integrative Biology at the University of California, Berkeley. Her dissertation project is titled the "Behavior and Ecology of Abdopus aculeatus from Sulawesi, Indonesia". Her research interests are: Cephalopod behavior, evolution, ecology, locomotion, taxonomy, muck communities, and coral reef rehabilitation. Visit her web site at Huffard NEW CMAS VOLUNTEERS CMAS has several new volunteers helping to run the Club. Bob Sosolik took over the job of membership chairman. This is a demanding position that has been handled by Jim and Marty Bash for more than five years. Please refer all future membership requests to Bob (630-231-4028). Fig 3) Boyd Corbett running the raffle Boyd Corbett is taking charge of CMAS raffles. He started last meeting with several substantial offerings ranging from zooanthid frags to a $100 gift certificate. The raffle tickets were given to any CMAS member attending the last meeting. Jeni Tyrell has agreed to print and send out the CMAS newsletter. Tom Sandercock writes and updates the web site. He has agreed to put together a one page summary of the web site and send it to Jeni. SPECIAL SHOWING OF DEEP SEA 3D CMAS members were invited to a special showing of "Deep Sea 3D" at the Navy Pier IMAX on March 2nd at 6:00p.m. In addition CMAS was given 5 pairs of free tickets given out on a first come, first served basis by Mike Kirda. Home