As promised in the Christmas special, we call the ‘squid-phone’ – a special line used by scientists globally when they seem something strange and squiddy. On the other end of that line is Mike Vecchione, the expert on cephalopods. We talk giant and colossal squid (to audible groans from Mike); the bigfin squid (Magnapinna), most famous for being the squid with the long trailing arms that’s often used as an example of terrifying deep-sea creatures, but also a species, genus and Family that Mike described and would love more sightings of.

In recent news, we worry about deep-ocean circulation and its impact on climate. Reflect on a year of amazing sightings from Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) including the giant phantom jelly (Stygiomedusa gigantea) and barreleye fish (Macropinna microstoma).

We also address a snailfish imposter. The world’s deepest fish, the Mariana snailfish is more often than not represented by an image of a totally different species that happens to have a more attractive headshot. Prema Arasu presents her poem; An Ode to the Blobfish, in honour of another species dominated by one misleading photo.

Our regular contributors drop by too: Larkin – our resident deckhand tells the tale of an impromptu squid dissection and Don Walsh reflects on piloting the super-deep diving bathyscaphe Trieste in a time when giant squid attack was still a worry.

An Ode to the Blobfish by Prema Arasu

O Psychrolutes marcidus! O gelatinous shape!

Thou art the ravish’d bride of deep-sea trawlers—

Unassuming foster child of the timeless abyss

Untimely ripp’d from thy diatomaceous womb

Fearful fishermen rejoice at thy sacrifice

An Antipodean altar attended by inchoate priest—

Then once by man and angels to be seen,

In roaring thou shall rise and on the surface die.

Were I anointed and dragged to your Hadal habitus

Flayed and deconsecrated at thy mucilaginous prow—

Were I to partake in salt’d communion

With thou, we would be one and the same.

Hideousness is a lie, lies hideousness, that is all

We know on land, and all we need to know.

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Correction

The Permian-Triassic extinction was not 98% of marine life, 96% of often cited but 81% seems the most accurate current estimate.

Links

Check out this fantastic book that Mike co-authored if you would like to learn more about cephalopods

Larkin’s YouTube channel My Salty Sea Life

More info about Prema Arasu

Deep-ocean circulation paper

The piezothermal effect

The polar see-saw

MBARI have had a great year for filming deep-sea critters and have a great best-of reel on YouTube.

Pink hand fish

Football fish

Falkor mural

Soft robotic snailfish

Blue Planet II poster

Nautilus Magazine

Alan's interview

Global assessment of hadal fishes – our big paper

Abyssobrotula galatheae – previous deepest fish from a single report

Bony-eared assfish

Top 5% of podcasts

Lonesome marine biologist Nando

Recent bigfin squid video

Zappa jellyfish

Observational articles: a tool to reconstruct ecological history based on chronicling unusual events by Ferdinando "Nando" Boero

Deepest squid paper

Deepest octopi paper

The Pteropods – swimming snails

Oegopsida or Oceanic squids, the true squid

Myopsids or coastal squids, could be considered true squid

Sepiolida the Bobtail squids

Vampyroteuthis infernalis the vampire squid, more closely related to octopods

Magnapinna sp. The bigfin squid, a charismatic and recently discovered family (the one's that creep everyone out!)

My Octopus Teacher on Netflix

Ramshorn squid (Spirula)

The Serpent Project

Credits

Theme – Hadal Zone Express by Märvel

Logo image

The Atacama snailfish which is often published as the Mariana snailfish

The long-arm squid filmed by DSV Alvin, possibly an adult Magnapinna sp. Public Domain NOAA