Help Save The Tree Octopus From Extinction!

Animal Lovers must act soon! This beautiful Cephalopod needs our help!

[quote]The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
i[/i]
[color=green]Help Save The Tree Octopus From Extinction![/color]

About The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus

Tree octopus photo,
Rare photo of the elusive tree octopus

The Pacific Northwest tree octopus (Octopus paxarbolis) can be found in the temperate rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula on the west coast of North America. Their habitat lies on the Eastern side of the Olympic mountain range, adjacent to Hood Canal. These solitary cephalopods reach an average size (measured from arm-tip to mantle-tip,) of 30-33 cm. Unlike most other cephalopods, tree octopuses are amphibious, spending only their early life and the period of their mating season in their ancestral aquatic environment. Because of the moistness of the rainforests and specialized skin adaptations, they are able to keep from becoming desiccated for prolonged periods of time, but given the chance they would prefer resting in pooled water.

An intelligent and inquisitive being (it has the largest brain-to-body ratio for any mollusk), the tree octopus explores its arboreal world by both touch and sight. Adaptations its ancestors originally evolved in the three dimensional environment of the sea have been put to good use in the spatially complex maze of the coniferous Olympic rainforests. The challenges and richness of this environment (and the intimate way in which it interacts with it,) may account for the tree octopus’s advanced behavioral development. (Some evolutionary theorists suppose that “arboreal adaptation” is what laid the groundwork in primates for the evolution of the human mind.)

Reaching out with one of her eight arms, each covered in sensitive suckers, a tree octopus might grab a branch to pull herself along in a form of locomotion called tentaculation; or she might be preparing to strike at an insect or small vertebrate, such as a frog or rodent, or steal an egg from a bird’s nest; or she might even be examining some object that caught her fancy, instinctively desiring to manipulate it with her dexterous limbs (really deserving the title “sensory organs” more than mere “limbs”,) in order to better know it.
Range map
Map of estimated tree octopus maximum range, including spawning waters.

Tree octopuses have eyesight comparable to humans. Besides allowing them to see their prey and environment, it helps them in inter-octopus relations. Although they are not social animals like us, they display to one-another their emotions through their ability to change the color of their skin: red indicates anger, white fear, while they normally maintain a mottled brown tone to blend in with the background.

The reproductive cycle of the tree octopus is still linked to its roots in the waters of the Puget Sound from where it is thought to have originated. Every year, in Spring, tree octopuses leave their homes in the Olympic National Forest and migrate towards the shore and, eventually, their spawning grounds in Hood Canal. There, they congregate (the only real social time in their lives,) and find mates. After the male has deposited his sperm, he returns to the forests, leaving the female to find an aquatic lair in which to attach her strands of egg-clusters. The female will guard and care for her eggs until they hatch, refusing even to eat, and usually dying from her selflessness. The young will spend the first month or so floating through Hood Canal, Admiralty Inlet, and as far as North Puget Sound before eventually moving out of the water and beginning their adult lives.[color=green](read more the link)[/color]
zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/[/quote]

you could’ve tried a more believable hoax. :s

Ah, The Olympic National Forest In Wash. State. Wicked Place. Spent many camping trips there. Was always well-prepared for those savage fearsome deadly 'pusHeads, who tend to rush one’s perimeter in well-excecuted assault waves. And yes, they have sappers. Two or more command posts are essential!

Funny link. :laughing: I only wish I had the same kinda spare time as the author to even be able to think about the idea! :frowning:

This is a picture of a Giant Sahara Tree Octopus I took home as a pet.

[quote=“Mitchell”]you could’ve tried a more believable hoax. :s[/quote]Mitchell -
Glad you have an interest in saving the endangered animals
Perhaps the Mountain Walrus would be more to your liking.

[quote]
Once plentiful, the mountain walruses numbers have been reduced to only 500, down from the 50,000 counted in 1938.


Save The Mountain Walrus

I have spent the last 15 years devoting my life to studying the rare Mountain Walrus (Odobenus montanus). I have followed them to their hidden dens and have taken pictures of the elusive beast. Because I have come to care so much for this endangered animal, I am posting my findings here in hopes that others like me will fight for the survival of such a magnificent creature.
The endangered mountain walrus lives along the mountain ranges on the West Coast, between Washington and California. A few have been found in the deserts of Nevada and some have even been sighted in Yosemite National Park. Their natural habitat is just below the treelines of mountain scapes, although they will descend further into the forests if food becomes scarce enough. Fierce creatures though they are, they cannot defend themselves against encroaching development. Their habitat has been diminishing since the early 1930’s when clear-cut logging became widespread in the United States.
Found in the mountain regions along the west coast, the mountain walruses have had to deal with shrinking habitats as well as hunters.(more of this important story at the link)
web.archive.org/web/200201240244 … nx/walrus/[/quote]

Thanks Mitchell…with your care and support we can save these noble creatures who share the earth with us.

Another
un
worthy cause is the SAVE THE DION FUND.
A Dion is a cross between a dog and a lion.

[quote=“TainanCowboy”]
Perhaps the Mountain Walrus would be more to your liking.
.[/quote]

Well, duh, I only spent 2 years volunteering at a mountain walrus sanctuary in the swiss alps :smiley: you people think this is a joke?? it won’t be funny when theres not a single mountain walrus left on earth

[quote=“Mitchell”]Well, duh, I only spent 2 years volunteering at a mountain walrus sanctuary in the swiss alps :smiley: you people think this is a joke?? it won’t be funny when theres not a single mountain walrus left on earth[/quote]Mitchell -
:bravo: …now we can just wait for Comrade Stalin to start his CNY fund-raiser to “Save The Mountain OYSTERS.

Its an annual event for him. :sunglasses:

Surely, this thread has nothing to do with whale sharks… Glad to see this is in the flounder forum.

bobepine

[quote=“bobepine”]Surely, this thread has nothing to do with whale sharks… Glad to see this is in the flounder forum.
bobepine[/quote]bobpine -
??
Title of thread is “Help Save The Tree Octopus From Extinction!”

Nothing mentioned about ‘whale sharks’ in title.

Is there really such things as tree octopuses and mountain walruses?

bobepine

Besides TC made his opinion knwn about whale sharks elsewhere.

Anyone ever read the The Good Soldier Schweik? The author, Jaroslav Ha

I also found one among the links provided in this thread.

“We must change our pumpkin perceptions in order to change our pumpkin behaviors. The youngster in the photo wasn’t born with a desire to wear a pumpkin. Most assuredly an adult gutted the pumpkin and placed the child inside. This young person will probably grow up to be a pumpkin abuser too. Look closely at the picture, is the pumpkin smiling?”

Is it just me or the kid looks a lot like BFM? :saywhat:

bobepine