https://www.npr.org/2023/08/23/1195028955/heres-why-6-000-octopuses-like-to-be-under-the-sea-at-an-octopus-garden

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Thousands of octopuses gather off California to brood eggs at a warm
spot Over 6,000 octopuses have been found huddling around an extinct
volcano deep in the Pacific Ocean near California, and researchers
now think they understand why the octopuses find it so cozy.

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Science

Here's why 6,000 octopuses like to be under the sea at an 'octopus
garden'

August 23, 20232:02 PM ET
Heard on All Things Considered
Nell Greenfieldboyce 2010

Nell Greenfieldboyce

Here's why 6,000 octopuses like to be under the sea at an 'octopus
garden'

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[mbari_octo]
Enlarge this image

Researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute studied
female octopuses that nest together off Central California at a depth
of about 3,200 meters. MBARI hide caption

toggle caption
MBARI

Researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute studied
female octopuses that nest together off Central California at a depth
of about 3,200 meters.

MBARI

Off the coast of California is an unusual "octopus garden" -- the
largest congregation of deep-sea octopuses ever discovered on Earth,
where over 6,000 octopuses huddle around an extinct underwater
volcano in the black, cold ocean depths, almost two miles below the
surface.

Most are brooding females that spend their days doing nothing but
guarding nests full of eggs, a tedious task which can take nearly two
years. It would take even longer if not for the warm water seeping
from the seafloor that speeds up the growth of their babies,
according to new research that suggests this natural incubator is why
octopuses gather there in such huge numbers.

The discovery, published in the journal Science Advances on
Wednesday, highlights how low-key hydrothermal vents on the ocean
floor can create isolated patches of cozy warmth, hidden in the
darkness, that could play an outsized role in supporting deep-sea
life. Thousands of such spots could be dotted up and down coastlines,
researchers say.

"It's definitely a special site for these animals. It's a breeding
site for this octopus. It has effects for the entire community nearby
that then has spillover effects beyond that," says Jim Barry of the
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California, the lead
researcher for this work. "So it's regionally important and we still
know very little about it. How many more of these are there?"

A surprise in shimmering water

Scientists found this site about five years ago, when a submersible
vehicle got sent to explore some underwater hills around Davidson
Seamount, a submerged mountain off the coast of central California
that once was a volcano.

While the seamount was well-studied, the surrounding areas were not,
and researchers were shocked when the vehicle's headlamps suddenly
revealed large groups of purple octopuses, Muusoctopus robustus, that
were crouched over nests of eggs.

Octopuses generally are antisocial loners that would rather fight
another octopus than live in close quarters. And yet biologists had
stumbled onto an enormous octopus garden, a trippy scene straight out
of a Beatles song.

"They thought, 'Well, let's get a really close look.' And as they
zoomed into these octopus, then they saw this shimmering water and
they realized this is a thermal spring, this is warm water coming
out. And that was somewhat of a surprise because this is an inactive
volcano," explains Barry.

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The first time scientists ever observed a bunch of deep-sea octopuses
gathering together was about a decade ago, in another place where
warm water seeped out of the seafloor, off Costa Rica. But
researchers studying that rocky outcrop didn't see any viable eggs
and thought that perhaps the higher temperatures there had harmed
their development.

Just this summer, however, another expedition revisited that outcrop
and saw that it was actually an active, successful nursery.

"It really kind of blew my mind because it is so drastically
different and they're taking observations in the exact same places
that we had been looking at," says Anne Hartwell, with the Center for
Coastal & Ocean Mapping/Joint Hydrographic Center at the University
of New Hampshire, who visited the Costa Rica site in 2014.

Hartwell is part of the team that recently spent months doing robotic
work to study the octopus garden near California, to figure out what
role warm water might play in drawing octopuses together.

"The robots we use are so advanced and they have such great
technology and cameras and dexterity with their mechanical arms,"
says Hartwell. "They enable us to not quite be down there in person,
but get a lot done as if we were."

The researchers mapped an area the size of a few football fields in
detail, installed a time-lapse camera that watched octopuses
continuously, and visited individual octopus nests again and again
while monitoring water temperatures with probes.

[mbari_octo]
Enlarge this image

A time-lapse camera developed by engineers with the Monterey Bay
Aquarium Research Institute monitored the nesting octopuses in the
deep for more than six months. MBARI hide caption

toggle caption
MBARI

A time-lapse camera developed by engineers with the Monterey Bay
Aquarium Research Institute monitored the nesting octopuses in the
deep for more than six months.

MBARI

"We found 6,000 animals in just a small area, and that was just a
portion of where the octopuses are distributed. So we're estimating,
I don't know, up to 20,000 animals may be there," explains Barry. He
adds that the female octopuses are so focused on tending their nests
that they mostly ignored the investigators.

"We can drive up to within eight inches of them and hold a camera
right there. They don't do a thing," he says.

The allure of rare warmth in the deep

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The ocean water at this depth is normally about 35 degrees
Fahrenheit, but the spa-like waters seeping out of cracks and
crevices got up to about 51 degrees Fahrenheit--and that's where the
octopuses wanted to brood.

"The females only nest in warm sites. As far as we can tell, we could
find none in cold waters," says Barry. "There are plenty of nesting
sites available, but they don't nest on just any bare rock. They only
choose those sites where there's a nice warm pool. And in fact, if
one female leaves, we found that another one will jump in there
within a couple of weeks."

What's more, he says, the octopus eggs matured much more quickly than
one would expect, based on what's known about other octopuses that
live in the cold ocean depths.

Brood times for nesting females there seemed to be about 1.8 years,
while previous observations of a deep-sea octopus in cold water
showed that it took 4.5 years for its eggs to hatch, a length of time
longer than any other animal.

Biologists know from prior research that warming generally speeds the
pace of octopus embryo development. Barry says that having a shorter
brooding period should give the offspring a greater chance of
survival, since the female octopuses and their developing embryos
would spend less time in an immobile, vulnerable state.

[mbari_octo]
Enlarge this image

A female octopus in the deep Pacific ocean broods her eggs near a
warm hydrothermal spring. The warmth there seems to speed the
development of octopus embryos. MBARI hide caption

toggle caption
MBARI

A female octopus in the deep Pacific ocean broods her eggs near a
warm hydrothermal spring. The warmth there seems to speed the
development of octopus embryos.

MBARI

"Seeing that they are getting a brooding time of 1.8 years is
awesome. It shows that there's an advantage to these octopus breeding
their eggs in the warmer water," says Beth Orcutt of the Bigelow
Laboratory for Ocean Sciences in Maine, who has studied the octopus
populations off Costa Rica. "That's the first time we've been able to
look at that with this kind of data."

Janet Voight, an expert on deep-sea octopuses at the Field Museum of
Natural History in Chicago, says it's astonishing to her that the
California site has "a concentration of predators that exceeds any
reasonable expectation. It's like, whoa."

But these female octopuses have given up their predatory life to
reproduce and, instead, they themselves are being eaten when they
die. The octopus garden seems to support a teeming variety of other
life such as crustaceans, anemones and snails. "These are all parts
of an ecosystem that's sustained by the octopus being there and dying
in there," Voight says.

Despite the richness of this ecosystem, it could easily have been
missed by explorers, because the ocean bottom is so vast and dark,
illuminated only for brief moments by the lights of slow-moving
exploration vehicles.

"When you think of the deep sea, it's kind of muddy and flat and
nothing too much conspicuous around," says Voight. "Then you stumble
upon something like this and it's like a bonanza."

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