Teen pockets seashell to show niece, ends up fighting for his life David Strege Tue, December 5, 2023 at 10:30 AM CST·2 min read 420 An 18-year-old man in Australia was collecting seashells to show his niece and putting them into his pocket, not knowing a deadly creature was hiding inside one of them. Jacob Eggington could have been dead in 30 minutes had he not recognized he had been bitten on the leg by a blue-ringed octopus, one of the most venomous creatures in the world. Eggington was collecting shells at Shoalwater Beach in Perth on Monday, and when he pulled a shell out of his pocket to give to his niece, the deadly octopus emerged—just seconds before the toddler would have been holding it, according to 7News Perth. “That’s probably one of the more dramatic thoughts to think what could have happened,” Eggington’s brother Joshua told 7News. “So in the same way, he did get bitten, but he also probably saved one of his nieces’ or nephews’ lives.” A moment later, Jacob inspected his leg and spotted a small, painless bite. Emergency services were called, and he was stretchered off the beach and taken to Rockingham General Hospital where he was treated for over six hours to stabilize him. There is no antidote for the deadly toxins of the blue-ringed octopus. “And when they do bite, then that can be fatal within a half an hour,” Murdoch University marine scientist Jennifer Verduin told 7News. When someone is stung, it’s important to keep the victim as still as possible and call for help. The Australian Museum states that the blue-ringed octopus uses its “extremely powerful venom” to kill its prey, such as crabs and small fish, Yahoo News Australia reported. Ian Tibbetts, Associate Professor at the University of Queensland, told Yahoo News Australia the social media trend showing people handling these creatures is “alarming stupidity,” and warned at the time, “Someone might die doing this.”
Sea snails are also crazy poisonous. Cone snails kill more people annually than crocodiles or sharks.
I remember visiting a national park in West Australia and the guide telling me, “everything out there can kill you.”
For a very intelligent species, they’re as close to alien as we have on earth. Every other ‘smart’ creature is either a mammal or a bird, and they all came from relatively the same evolutionary branch. Octopuses, otoh, can only trace base common genetic back to flatworms. And 2/3 of their ‘brain’ tissue is in their arms. Totally alien. Portuguese Man-O-Wars are a symbiotic amalgamation of seven different creatures. Stay out of the water brah.
I have watched this episode several times and found it quite interesting. Octopus: Making Contact Follow an Alaskan professor as he raises and studies a day octopus in his home, making remarkable discoveries about its extraordinary intelligence, personality and skills. Octopuses are able to recognize faces and interact with other individuals. About the Episode Octopus behavior has fascinated humans for centuries; their unique shape and skillsets often provide the inspiration for extraterrestrials in science fiction. New in the world of cephalopod research is the extent to which these intelligent animals are individual personalities – able to recognize faces and interact with other individuals – all of which is an odd adaptation for an animal thought to live an asocial existence. Follow this new science through the story of a pet octopus and its evolving relationship with the passionate American scientist studying it in Nature – Octopus: Making Contact. Dr. David Scheel, a professor of marine biology at Alaska Pacific University in Anchorage, raises a day octopus in a tank in his home with assistance from his teenage daughter Laurel. Given the name Heidi, the octopus bonds with the Scheels, showing recognition of their faces, excitement when the humans come near and an inclination for playing with Laurel. Scheel links his discoveries — which also include Heidi’s demonstrated abilities to change color, solve puzzles, use tools and escape through small spaces — to octopus findings from all over the world, further proving the extraordinary intelligence of these incredible creatures. “Octopuses followed a different evolutionary path, making them different from all other intelligent animals on this planet,” said David Scheel. “I am less intrigued by the differences and more interested in our similarities. What kind of a connection is possible with an animal that has three hearts and blue blood running through its veins? It’s been a privilege to have a relationship with such a strange and wonderful creature.”
