VAMPIRE SQUID romps stun scientists: Unique sex lives revealed

Scientists studying vampire squid have discovered the weird creatures of the vasty deep are unique among their class in the way they reproduce. Cephalopods, which include squid and octopuses, breed at the very end of their life cycles, funneling all their energy into creating eggs that are released shortly before the parent …

[Paul Crawford]

Motion in the ocean

But does it make for a small craft advisory?

[Anonymous Coward]

The phrase "gonadal resting phase" should be in much higher general usage.

[Robert Helpmann??]

I'm Resting!

The phrase "gonadal resting phase" should be in much higher general usage.

It sure beats the phrase "rolled over and started snoring."

[Francis Boyle]

Re: I'm Resting!

It's certainly going on my list of bad band names.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Attack of the Killer Roombas! I can just see it now, along with such sequels as "Killer Roombas Eat France"... :-)

[frank ly]

Oh well

I was hoping for salacious stories about orgies at Goldman Sachs. This is more worthwhile though.

[phuzz]

Re: Oh well

It's unfair to compare that bunch of vicious, grasping, conscienceless, amoral, predators to the vampire squid.

[Tom Maddox]

Classified under . . .

. . . code name TENTACLE OPERA CLOAK.

[Anonymous Coward]

"We know very little about deep-sea orgasms..."

[Mark 85]

I had to look twice...

to make sure this wasn't a Lester Haines article.

I do find it interesting that someone's getting paid to study the sex lives of vampire squids. Will there be a new reality show in the offing?

[MrDamage]

Re: I had to look twice...

You mean Jersey Shore didn't give you enough insight into the sex lives of slow, strange looking creatures who deprived the immediate environment of oxygen lived in a low oxygen environment?

[Mark 85]

Re: I had to look twice...

I guess I'm one of the few people on the planet who haven't seen most of the reality shows. I watched a couple of times a few years ago. Choked. Gagged. Realized I wasted some time and never turned them on again.

[MonkeyCee]

Re: I had to look twice...

I thought reality TV was the modern equivalent of taking a tour of Bedlam Asylum.

Although my missus does love a good episode of "Farmer looking for wife" :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anybody else

feel a sense of empathy at "start accumulating energy for a new reproductive cycle"?

[imanidiot]

Re: Did anybody else

Jup, must be hard for the buggers to light a cigarette after the deed is done down there too.

[KitD]

So ...

where are the Octonauts when you need them?

[Swarthy]

Re: So ...

The certainly didn't cover the reproductive cycle, just one of their spines getting bent back and poking itself.

..Yes, I do have small children, why do you ask?

[Alistair]

They want to study the environment at the bottom of the oceans

Its good they're learning about critters down there.

Perhaps the best study of that part of the ocean would be "Activist investor protocols and Copyright and Patent law in the pelagic deep"

Or "How well lying, fiscally irresponsible political entities can feed vampire squid in the pelagic deep." -----

Or perhaps I'm just in a pissy mood this morning.

[JCitizen]

I'd imagine..

that most deep sea creatures filter food from above, with all the chaos happening way above them, all they have to do is wait for the detritus to filter down from the upper Epipelagic Zone ! Just imagine how many shallow sea creatures die without even becoming victims of some other hunter specie!?

[Tom 7]

Re: I'd imagine..

It seems that whales dive deep to eat things and generally shit at the surface - resulting in algal and other blooms and these fed similarly large populations of their predators and so on all the way up (down) the food chain. Given the reduction in the number of whales due to our greed and stupidity its thought the barren deeps were not really so barren a couple of hundred years ago.