Stumpy-spined Cuttlefish
by KJ Swan
Title
Stumpy-spined Cuttlefish
Artist
KJ Swan
Medium
Photograph
Description
The amazing 3-hearted Stumpy-spined cuttlefish (Sepia apama) has green-blue copper-based blood, a ring-shaped brain, a bird-like beak, a fin that encircles its mantle for fine maneuvering, a funnel that gives it jet-like propulsion and superb 360 degree vision. A close relative to the octopus, the cuttlefish is surprisingly intelligent and can mimic the shape and texture of objects around them.
Dwarf cuttlefish were introduced into the captive breeding program of the California Academy of Sciences, Steinhart Aquarium in 2009. Cuttlefish taken from their native waters near the Philippines and Indonesia, rarely survived so the Academy decided to spare wild populations and successfully bred stumpy-spined cuttlefish making them available to others zoos and aquariums. This one was feasting on a shrimp when I snapped this shot at the Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco.
Uploaded
January 3rd, 2019
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Comments (1)
Bill Morgenstern
Very cool. Looks like it just ate a small shrimp.
KJ Swan replied:
Thanks Bill, it happened so fast, all I saw of the shrimp is what you can see in this photo.
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