These socktopuses throw a mean – and random – octo punch.
A new article published Friday in the journal “Ecology” showed that octopuses beat fish – sometimes to hunt together, and sometimes just because.
“OCTOPUSES. PUNCH. FISHES !!” study co-author Eduardo Sampaio excited tweeted of the publication of his research. “This was probably the best thing I had about writing a paper. Ever!”
Octopuses and fish are known to hunt together, mutually benefiting from the other’s strengths – except when the ocean’s tentacles decide to randomly weigh their associates.
An octopus thrust looks like “a quick, explosive movement with one arm aimed at a specific fishing partner,” the paper describes – an act that takes little of their zeal for octopuses. “[Actively] hitting a fishing partner entails a small energetic cost to the actor (ie octopus), ”the authors explain.
Researchers shot eight octopus-on-fish fighting videos in the Red Sea between 2018 and 2019 with a diversity of victims, including squirrelfish, blacktip, lyretail, groupers, yellow-saddle and goatfishes.
While six of the fist outbreaks could be related to obvious octopus motives – including the healthy desire to “ensure cooperation” – two appear to be deliberate acts of fishing violence. The researchers don’t fully understand why octopuses sometimes have violent, purposeless episodes, but believe it could simply be ‘hateful behavior’ or some form of ‘punishment’.
How hurt the fish are by such outbursts – physically and emotionally – is also beyond the knowledge of science at present.
‘We’ve never seen permanent marks or anything like that from being hit, but we can’t say for sure whether fish are hurt or not. Obviously they don’t like it! “Sampaio tweeted.
In addition to experiencing seemingly unnecessary bursts of aggression, octopuses also resemble humans in giving hugs, dreams, being negatively impacted by climate change, and preferring a feely-touchy group to chill alone with a Chewbacca action figure when they get dosed with molly.