![]() “If substrate is important for squid to avoid predation than that indicates that increases or decreases in squid populations are even more tied to the health of coral reef than we thought.” Ryuta Nakajima, OIST visiting researcher. Previous studies on cephalopod camouflage have mostly been conducted on cuttlefish and octopus. Squid, as an animal that tends to live in the open ocean, are notoriously hard to keep in captivity and so have been rather avoided for this kind of research. ![]() ![]() But, since 2017, the scientists in the OIST’s Physics and Biology Unit have been culturing a species of oval squid in captivity. This squid, locally known as Shiro-ika, is one of three oval squids found in Okinawa. When in the open ocean, they are light in color, meaning that they blend into the ocean surface and flickering sunlight above. The researchers were cleaning their tank to remove the algal growth.īut the researchers suspected that when they moved closer to the ocean floor, it would be a different story entirely.Īt OIST’s Marine Science Station, the oval squid were, almost accidentally, observed camouflaging to the substrate for the first time. They noticed that the animals were changing color depending on whether they were over the cleaned surface or the algae.įollowing this observation, the researchers performed a controlled experiment. They kept several squid in a tank and cleaned half of the tank, leaving the other half covered in algae. They placed an underwater camera inside the water and suspended a regular camera above, so they could capture and run statistical tests on any color changes. When the squid were in the clean side of the tank, they were the light color. But when they were above the algae, they promptly became darker. The experiment uncovered an ability that had never previously been reported in squid.
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