Did You Know?

Kelp absorbs carbon dioxide in the ocean where shellfish grow.

Generally the future of the ocean and its inhabitants, due to the climate crisis, doesn’t give us reason for optimism. But there seems to be hope for some cephalopod species to thrive.

Octopuses have a relatively big brain just like other smart animals. But their highly complex nervous system evolved independently from vertebrates. Surprisingly, most of the neurons that do the computing for the brain are in the octopus’s arms. And that means they may have essentially nine brains, not one.

The extreme heat wave that hit the Pacific Northwest in July wasn’t just brutal on us it also killed an estimated billion coastal marine animals. It’s hard to grasp the extent of the mass die-off of mussels, oysters, sea cucumbers, sea stars, and many other species.

Purple has always been a ‘royal’ color that originally came from snail slime. You heard right: snail slime!Archeologists have dated “royal” purple garments dyed with snails to as old as 1,000 B.C and only three species produce this dye.

There is a squid so HUGE it has made sucker scars on sperm whales found washed ashore.

You’ve got to see My Octopus Teacher! We never imagined someone could spend a year following a wild female octopus through that kelp forest almost every day.

“Darwin's Paradox” asks how productive and diverse ecosystems like coral reefs thrive in the ocean equivalent of a desert with few nutrients.The answer is sponges.