Octopolis and Octlantis explained

Octopolis and Octlantis are two non-human settlements occupied by gloomy octopuses (Octopus tetricus) in Jervis Bay, on the south coast of New South Wales. The first site, named "Octopolis" by biologists, was found in 2009. Octopolis consists of a bed of shells (mainly scallop shells) in an ellipse shape, 2–3 meters diameter on its longer axis, with a single piece of anthropogenic detritus, believed to be scrap metal, within the site. Octopuses build dens by burrowing into the shell bed. The shells appear to provide a much better building material for the octopuses than the fine sediment around the site. Up to 14 octopuses have been seen at Octopolis at a single time. In 2016, a second settlement was found nearby, named "Octlantis," which includes no human-made objects and can house similar numbers of octopuses.^[1] Both sites are within Booderee National Park. Some media accounts have described these sites as octopus "cities," but researchers who have worked on the sites view this as a misleading analogy.^{[2] [3]}

See also

• Cephalopod intelligence
• Octopus's Garden, a 1969 song by the Beatles. Ringo Starr wrote the song after learning about how octopuses travel along the sea bed picking up stones and shiny objects with which to build gardens.^[4]

Further reading

• Gallery of the Settlements
• Octopuses More Social Than Thought, 'Octopolis' Denizens Prove, NewsWeek
• Octopolis at the Giant Cuttlefish blog

External links

• Godfrey-Smith . Peter . Scheel . David . Chancellor . Stephanie . Linquist . Stefan . Lawrence . Matthew . In the Line of Fire: Debris Throwing by Wild Octopuses . bioRxiv . 1 January 2021 . 10.1101/2021.08.18.456805 . en.
• Godfrey-Smith . Peter . Lawrence . Matthew . Long-term high-density occupation of a site by Octopus tetricus and possible site modification due to foraging behavior . Marine and Freshwater Behaviour and Physiology . July 2012 . 45 . 4 . 1–8 . 10.1080/10236244.2012.727617 . 2012MFBP...45....1G . 83893501 . en . 1023-6244.

Notes and References

1. Scheel . David . Chancellor . Stephanie . Hing . Martin . Lawrence . Matthew . Linquist . Stefan . Godfrey-Smith . Peter . 2017-07-04 . A second site occupied by Octopus tetricus at high densities, with notes on their ecology and behavior . Marine and Freshwater Behaviour and Physiology . en . 50 . 4 . 285–291 . 10.1080/10236244.2017.1369851 . 2017MFBP...50..285S . 89738642 . 1023-6244 . 2023-05-28 . 2023-05-28 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230528161225/https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10236244.2017.1369851 . live .
2. Scheel, David; Godfrey-Smith, Peter; Linquist, Stefan; Chancellor, Stephanie; Hing, Martin; Lawrence, Matthew . Octopus engineering, intentional and inadvertent . Communicative & Integrative Biology . 2018 . 11 . 1 . e1395994 . 10.1080/19420889.2017.1395994 . 28338698 . 5824970 . Communicative & Integrative Biology 11, 2018 – Issue 1.
3. Web site: Hing . Martin . Godfrey-Smith . Peter . Did they mean to do that? Accident and intent in an octopuses’ garden . The Conversation . 13 May 2024 . 13 November 2017.
4. Web site: Abbey Road . 25 September 2009 . The Beatles Interview Database.