Birds and Nature Vol. 09 No. 5 [May 1901] / Illustrated by Color Photography

by Various

The “Argonaut,” or “Paper Sailor,” is no less beautiful and interesting than the Pearly Nautilus. The thin and fragile shell cannot be compared with that of the Nautilus nor with the pen, or internal support, of the squid, for it is attached to the animal by no muscles, and is only kept in position by the broad webs on the upper arms of the female (which alone possesses a shell), its function being simply to protect the eggs. The male is very much smaller than the female and is exceedingly rare. The natural position of the female is with its arms spread out and hanging about the shell, four in front and four behind, the two broad arms supporting the shell being spread out and closely embracing the latter. The siphon is turned toward the ridged part of the shell and the animal progresses in a backward direction by forcibly ejecting water through this organ. It crawls with the shell on its back, like a snail.

The poets have given us many beautiful writings detailing the vices and virtues of the lower forms of life and among these the Pearly Nautilus and Paper Sailor have received a goodly share of the muse’s attention. But, alas! for the poet, who, not being a conchologist, has sadly misused and misjudged these helpless and harmless creatures. Thus we are told how the paper nautilus sails over the ocean with his “sails” (meaning the two expanded arms) spread out to catch the breeze, and how, when the storm approaches, it folds its sails and disappears beneath the waters of the ocean. Alas for the poet! he puts the most beautiful ideas together in verse, ideas and themes which we would fain believe; but along comes cold, calculating science, and at one fell stroke sweeps away all that the poet has done, for in the poem on the Argonaut all is wrong, the animal does not and could not sail, for were it to do so the shell would fall and become lost in the bottom of the ocean.

A mollusk whose shell is cast upon the shore by thousands, but the animal of which is very rare, is the Spirula. The shell is less than an inch in diameter, is made in the form of a loose spiral and is divided into little chambers connected by a siphuncle. The shell of this genus does not contain the animal, as in Nautilus, but it is enveloped in two flaps of the mantle, at the posterior part of the animal, the shell being concealed with the exception of a part of the edge on each side. The body of the animal is long and cylindrical and the arms are quite short, more nearly resembling those of the Nautilus than those of the Octopus or squid. The body ends in a disk which is supposed to be a kind of sucker, by which the animal can adhere to rocks, thus enabling it to freely use its arms in obtaining food. It has been supposed by some anatomists that the shells of the fossil Ammonites were attached to the animal in a similar manner, and if this should be true these small mollusks would assume a new meaning as being the last survivors of a large group of animals of which all except Spirula are extinct.

Probably the best known of the shell-less cephalopods is the octopus, with its rounded body, large eyes and long arms. Almost everybody has read Victor Hugo’s weird account of the octopus in his “Toilers of the Sea,” and the animal has thus been rendered more or less familiar, although it was made to do several things by the author that it would not do in nature, as, for example, “drinking” a man alive. The Octopus is found abundantly throughout temperate and tropical seas, generally on the coast among rocks, but frequently on the sandy bottom in water of moderate depth. Here it may occasionally be seen “walking” clumsily along on its eight long arms, its little round body being balanced above the arms. Its favorite position, however, is among the rocks. In such a locality it will squeeze its body into some crevice and spread out its arms until they form a sort of web, resembling in this position a huge spider waiting for its prey. And it may well be likened to a spider for from this web there is no escape if once a hapless fish has come in contact with the powerful suckers on the long arms. The poor fish is paralyzed when seized by the octopus and is drawn towards the mouth, where it is torn to pieces by the beak-like jaws, and swallowed.

Like many of the mollusks of which we have written the octopus is esteemed as a valuable article of food by several savage tribes as well as by some civilized people. The native of the Pacific coast catches the Octopus (Octopus punctatus) by a very ingenious method. Providing himself with a spear twelve or fourteen feet long which has four or five barbed pieces of hard wood some fourteen inches long attached to the end, he paddles his canoe to the feeding-ground of the mollusk. One is soon found in ten or twelve feet of water and the Indian carefully lets down his spear until within a few inches of the center of the animal, when he quickly plunges it into the soft mass. Instantly the water is in commotion, the eight long arms writhing about in an endeavor to reach the boat. The Indian knows that should this happen his chances for life would be slim indeed. But he is prepared, and carefully lifting up the octopus with his barbed spear until it is above the surface of the water, he plunges a long, sharp spear, with which he is provided, into each arm where it joins the body. At each plunge of the spear, an arm becomes helpless and in a short time the animal, which but a few moments before had the power of a score of men, lies in the canoe, a shapeless, helpless mass.

That the octopus is good eating the writer can attest from experience, for during a visit to Yucatan some years ago this mollusk was served as a meat dish and was very palatable, the flesh being firm and tender and much resembling chicken. The portion which fell to the writer was the head, with a part of the arms attached.

One of the most interesting characteristics of the Octopi and allied cephalopods is their facility for changing color when danger is near. These changes are caused by little pigment cells just beneath the skin, which expand and contract. Thus, if a person is looking at an octopus in captivity and the animal is so placed that it cannot escape, the observer will be astonished to see the body of the animal suddenly assume a deep pinkish color which in turn is succeeded by a blue and then by a green, and finally a return to pink. The body is covered with these little pigment cells, the different colors—pink, blue and green—being so evenly scattered over the surface than when each color cell is expanded the whole body assumes that tinge. This is one of the most wonderful characteristics of the Mollusca.

Another cephalopod closely related to the Octopus is the Squid, several species of which are found on the Atlantic coast of the United States. In this genus the body is long and cylindrical, ends in two fins, has a prominent head terminating in eight short and two long arms and is supported by a long, cartilaginous, internal pen, which is made up of a central shaft with expansions on each side like a quill, hence the name “pen.” These animals are very numerous in individuals and form a large part of the food of fishes, like the blue-fish, black bass, etc., and have even been found in the stomach of jelly-fishes. Besides being eaten by the fish the squid furnishes a large part of the food of some whales, the former occurring frequently in shoals and falling ready victims to the huge monster.

In Norway and Sweden the people have a legend of a peculiar sea-monster, called the Kraken, which was probably founded on some of the enormous squids discovered during the past thirty years. Many of these mollusks are found off the coasts of Norway, Scotland and Ireland, and not a few have been recorded from the coasts of Nova Scotia and New England. In the larger of these animals the body is eight or ten feet long, the short arms eight feet and the long, tentacular arms thirty feet in length, making in all an animal nearly forty feet long when fully stretched out! The squid is greatly prized as bait and frequently a royal battle will take place between one of these gigantic creatures and a boat’s crew. Sad indeed is the fate of the latter if the mollusk once gets a firm hold of the boat. Care is used, however, to guard against such a result, and the animal is gradually deprived of its strength by making a sudden dash, cutting off an arm and as quickly retreating. These large squids are not as common as the smaller ones and they are rarely captured.

An ingenious method of capturing a species of the smaller squids (Ommastrephes illecebrosa) in use by the fishermen of the New England coast is as follows: The squid has the habit of swimming in an opposite direction to a light, as the full moon, so the fishermen go out to sea in boats, light a large torch in each boat and slowly row toward the shore, driving the squid, which of course swim backward in an opposite direction from the light, upon the beach, where they may be gathered by thousands after such an expedition. Another method of capture is by jigging; the jig is made of a piece of lead some two inches in length which is armed with a circle of sharp, unbarbed wires pointing upward and curving outward. The process of jigging is accomplished as follows: the jig is attached to twelve or fifteen feet of stout line and is lowered into the water, which is generally chosen of a depth of ten feet from the side of a small boat. When near the bottom it is kept moving slowly up and down until a squid is felt upon it, when it is suddenly drawn to the surface with the squid attached. These squid, when caught, are used for bait, a single fishing smack being known to use as many as eighty thousand squids in a single season.