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Expedition captures images of octopus at 7000 meters

Octopus on Wetpixel
Image by Atlantic Productions for Discovery Channel

The BBC reports that the Five Deeps expedition has published stills of a Dumbo octopus (Grimpoteuthis sp) from a depth of 6.957m (22,825ft). They were captured using a “lander” or instrument frame with an attached camera and (in this instance) a bait that is lowered to the seabed. The previously deepest recorded cephalopod was a Cirroteuthidae sp pictured at 5145m (16,880ft) off Barbados in 1971.

The discovery was made in the Java Trench, Indian Ocean, and was published in the journal Marine Biology.