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Giant squid use bioluminescence to hunt prey, communicate mongabay.com February 23, 2007
Last year Japanese researchers caused a sensation when they captured the first video of a live giant squid off the Ogasawara Islands, western North Pacific. At the time little was known about the elusive beast. Now the scientists have published their findings which show that giant squid (Taningia danae) are highly active predators that use blinding light flashes to confuse their prey.
"This emission may work as a blinding flash for the prey, as well as a means of illumination and measuring target distance in an otherwise dark environment," write the authors, referring to short bursts of light observed when squid were hunting. "The most interesting bioluminescence observed was a long glow when approaching (4.4–8.5 s) and several short glows separated by intervals when wandering around the bait without attacking. We believe that this behaviour may represent attempts at communication with conspecifics using bioluminescence," the add. The researchers used a bait ring, underwater lights, and a video camera to make their observations. They found that "blue light seemed provocative" for squid. "Attacking to the blue-filtered halogen light might be an aggressive behaviour against potential adversaries," they noted. The paper was published at the same time that fishermen from New Zealand reported the first ever capture of the colossal squid, a species larger, and even more mysterious than the giant squid. Comments? News options News index | RSS | Add to MyYahoo! Advertisements: Organic Apparel from Patagonia | Insect-repelling clothing |
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