THREE Dumbo Octopuses on One Deep-Sea Dive!
If you’re looking for a dumbo octopus, it turns out the abyssal plain in international waters outside the Marshall Islands and Wake Atoll EEZ is the spot to be! Within a span of eight hours during a dive with ROVs Little Hercules and Atalanta exploring over 5,800 meters (19,000 feet) deep, our team spotted THREE of these adorable cephalopods. The abyssal plain in this region has not been explored by any other known deep submergence dives.
Watch as these octopods swim over the deep sediment of this part of the deep seafloor, showing off their suckered tentacles and ear-shaped fins that earned them the Dumbo name. Coming in various shades of pink, purple, and orange in this multi-species group, one of them even appears to be “walking” along the seafloor! Dumbo octopods (Family Grimpoteuthidae) and their relatives are in the Suborder Cirrata - characterized by the small, cilia-like strands called cirri that line each arm.
Ocean Exploration Trust's Exploration of Wake Island's Deep-Sea expedition is supported by NOAA Ocean Exploration via the Ocean Exploration Cooperative Institute.
Exploration of Wake Island's Deep Sea
Located roughly midway between the Hawaiian and Mariana Islands, Wake Island is one of the most isolated land masses on Earth. While there have been some recent expeditions to this remote region, the vast majority of the 407,241 square kilometers of seafloor surrounding Wake remains unmapped and uncharacterized, thereby representing one of the most poorly surveyed areas under US jurisdiction.
