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Tag: octopus

Eat more octopus

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Awards, Awards 2016, Awards 2017, Coast Lines, Outdoors, Second Place, Special Sections, Third Place.

There is hope on the horizon for stone crabbers who are fed up with octopus eating the stone crabs right out of their traps.

When he’s not busy developing algorithms for predicting the camouflage patterns of octopuses, new Mote Marine Laboratory researcher Dr. Noam Josef is studying the octopus/stone crab relationship.

On the surface, it’s pretty straightforward.

An octopus spots a stone crab in a trap, realizes it can’t get away, slithers into the trap and gobbles it down.

Third Place

Humorous Column

2016

It’s a fate far more final than being pulled out of the water by a fishermen and having an arm snapped off before being tossed back into the water to grow a new one.

Unless they’re deep fried, local stone crabbers hate octopuses, which pay absolutely no attention whatsoever to state wildlife laws that prohibit tampering with traps.

Second Place

That is so… Florida

2017

 

Josef hopes to come up with ways to deter the lawless thieves from bellying up to the captive crab buffet.

But it won’t be easy.

Octopuses are smart. Very smart, Josef says.

They are the only invertebrates that solve problems on their own. They can even be trained for multiple complex tasks.

Eating a stone crab in a trap is like shooting fish in a barrel to an octopus.

Josef will be talking to local fishermen to find out how many of their stone crabs octopuses eat, how, when and where they eat them and how to stop them. In scientific terms, that’s quantifying, characterizing, strategizing and exterminating the slippery little devils.

He will spy on octopuses with video recorders positioned at crab traps to see how they get in and out of the underwater fast food swim-throughs.

And he plans to run an experiment (however obvious) on whether declawed stone crabs are more vulnerable to octopuses than crabs with claws.

At the same time, with Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition researcher David Fries, he will be working on developing flexible and biodegradable electronic displays that mimic octopus camouflage, which Mote says could be used in fashion (a shirt that goes from stripes to polka dots?), recreational diving (a wetsuit that blends in with its surroundings?), and even the military (a cloaking device for Jeeps?).

Octopuses and other cephalopods have complex skin with cells that contain pigment sacs which expand to display color and contract to hide color. Beneath the sacs is a protein layer that reflects, absorbs and diffuses light like a backlit LED screen.

The octopus controls the cells with its brain, so its color and pattern can change as fast as he can think it – one-tenth of a second – far faster than the laid-back chameleon, which uses hormones to change color.

With all that built-in technology, brainpower and sheer cunning, it seems a shame to fry up an octopus for dinner.

But when you’ve got no crabs, you’ve got no choice.

Pass the lemon butter.

Coast Lines: Octopi and golf balls – a perfect match

Written by Cindy Lane on . Posted in Awards, Awards 2010, Coast Lines, First Place, Fishing, Outdoors, Special Sections.

It doesn’t surprise John Labash to pull yet another stone crab trap out of the Gulf of Mexico and find an octopus has gobbled up his profits.

He just bags the octopus and sells it to Bell Fish Co. in Cortez, where it will be sold as a Mediterranean dinner entrée, and that’ll teach it, by golly.

What did raise an eyebrow, and his curiosity, was the golf ball that an octopus apparently brought into the trap with it.

Third Place

Humorous Column

2010

The first time.

Then it happened again. And again – five times, he says. So, even if you take into account the Mark Twainish exaggeration of any fish story, that’s at least a couple or three times.

Apparently, octopi view plastic stone crab traps like HGTV fans view the annual designer home giveaway – it’s chic, it’s free and you want to put your own personal touch on it – in this case, a dimpled plastic ball filled with environmentally incorrect rubber string.

Octopi bring shells and rocks into crab traps to make cozy nests, Laba

sh says, so from the octopus standpoint, a golf ball may be the perfect home décor item – a perfectly round objet d’art with clean lines, very modern, they give it a 10. If it was stainless steel, they’d put it in their kitchen.

“They just throw them in there and set up shop,” he says.

Are octopi just nearsighted, mistaking golf balls for sea turtle egg appetizers?

Or are they obsessive/compulsive janitors of the Gulf, whisking up what humans leave behind and cleverly putting the trash into a trap that another human will clean up?

And what’s up with people golfing into the Gulf, anyway?

There oughtta be a law.

As a matter of fact, the state litter law (FS 403.413) lists garbage, refuse, trash, cans, bottles, boxes, containers, paper, tobacco products, appliances, mechanical equipment, building material, machinery, wood, motor vehicles, vessels, aircraft and lots of other things as litter.

But, says Capt. Carol Keyser of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, “There’s nothing that references golf balls.”

However, she’s quick to add, “That doesn’t make it morally right” to golf into the Gulf. “We encourage people not to do that. Can’t you just go to a golf course?”

There’s one conveniently located in Holmes Beach, by the way, where the city code is also devoid of Gulf golfing regulations.

“It is something that probably should be brought up” to the city commission, Holmes Beach Code Enforcement Officer Nancy Hall said.

The Anna Maria code also is as silent as a putting green at Augusta.

“Who would have thought anyone would do that?” Code Enforcement Officer Gerry Rathvon wondered.

Sgt. Dave Turner of the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office in Anna Maria said that if an officer saw someone golfing on the beach, “We would ask them to stop, and take their name.”

Bradenton Beach police would speak to a hacker practicing his sand trap maneuvers too, but there’s nothing in the city code about it, an officer said.

But golfers beware of Jay Moyles, Manatee County’s chief lifeguard.

“If someone’s out there with a golf club playing ‘Caddyshack,’ we’re going to say ‘no way,’ ” at least on Manatee and Coquina public beaches, he said. What if the golfer slices and hits someone at the concession stand?

Golfers will even go out on boats equipped with green artificial turf on the stern, he said, an idea inspired by cruise ships with driving ranges. To heck with the effect on the residents of the Gulf.

In an old Seinfeld sitcom episode, George Costanza saved a beached whale by taking a golf ball out of its blowhole.

But in real life, last April, a golf ball was found in the stomach of a beached whale near Seattle. It probably didn’t kill him, but it didn’t do him any favors, either.

That same month, oil began to gush into the Gulf from the Deepwater Horizon well.

In comparison, golf balls are small things.

But the cumulative effect is a concern, says Grea Bevis, chief of the law enforcement division of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.

“It’s a litter violation for sure. It’s solid waste, because the golfer has no intention of retrieving the ball,” he said.

It’s the first time DEP has heard of such a thing, and the department plans to take an educational approach before filing charges against golfers, he said.

So, golfers, how about sticking to the sand at the golf course?

And enjoy that octopus on the menu at the clubhouse.