This awesome wan purpleness Octomom off the seashore of California brooded her clutch of eggs for four and half a years . That ’s the longest known brooding period of any animal on the satellite .
distaff octopuses typically have a single reproductive flow , and then they perish . For shallow - H2O species , maternal maintenance lasts up to three months . The premature record book holder for foresighted devilfish pensiveness was the deep - livingBathypolypus arcticus : 14 calendar month in the lab . But we fuck very little about deep - ocean species in their born home ground .
A triad of researchers led byBruce Robison from Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute ( MBARI)first met this deep - seaGraneledone boreopacificamom in April 2007 . They were surveying an marooned rocky outcrop about 1,397 meters ( 4,583 feet ) deep in the Monterey Submarine Canyon using a remotely operated vehicle . They spotted her moving slowly on sediment nearby .
When they returned in May 2007 , she was cleave to the perpendicular rock face , guarding a clutches of nut she ’d cement on . The squad knew it was the same devoted female person over the row of 18 visits thanks to a distinct scar on the vane between two branch , and their continuous increase indicate the clutch was the same . The break young require lots of atomic number 8 , so the female person must continuously bath the long eggs in fresh brine and keep them from being encompass with silt . At the same fourth dimension , she must push away all would - be nut predators . Here she is hang on in 2009 .
" It went on and on , and we were just staggered,“Robison tells Nature . " Every time we ’d swing down to visit we ’d say , ' This is the last time she ’s get to be here . ' " The eggs hatched between the team ’s September and October 2011 trips – when only empty egg cases were notice ( pictured below ) . Octomom ’s clutch size was between 155 to 165 eggs , and the brooding period totaled 53 months . Theworkwas publish inPLoS Onethis week .
Because these young octopuses had so long to develop , they could drown and hunt soon after cover , which increases their natural selection betting odds . The team spotted a few on the same rock later .
The trade - off with Octomom ’s doting strategy is between her power to brook the farseeing incubation menstruation and the competitiveness of her hatchlings . During the 53 - month period , the researchers never witnessed her alimentation ; she grew paler and lost weight , her skin loosened and her eyes grew cloudy . broken temperatures ( 3 degrees Celsius ) and her inactiveness keep her metabolic demand low , and maybe she absorbed damaged eggs or piece on crabs photographed nearby .
The longest guarded incubation live for fish is five months by the Magellan plunder fish . For birds , the longest continuous ball brooding goes to emperor penguins with two month . Then there are “ live - bearing ” coinage , whose embryos develop internally so that when they ’re born , they ’ve essentially mini reading of the adult : Elephants gestate for 20 to 21 months , frilled sharks bear embryo for 42 month , and the gestation period of alpine salamanders is 48 month .
Octomom may still be out there , I care to think . As a general rule among octopuses , brooding makes up a quarter of their lifespan . Check out some very noteworthy footage here :
trope : MBARI news release(top , middle ) , 2014 Robison et al . ( bottom )
UPDATE : Earlier version mistakenly say " 53 weeks . "
