Cuttlefish use dazzling camouflage to disguise themselves while stalking their prey. New video footage reveals even more about their dramatic mimicry techniques, including how they transform to look like a non-threatening object such as a leaf or coral.
鈥淭hese are masters, the hypnotists of the underwater world,鈥� says at the University of Bristol, UK.
Cuttlefish can change their colour and texture in less than a second thanks to millions of pigment sacs in their skin called chromatophores. They can also create and control precise patterns on their bodies, such as moving stripes. When Santon travelled to Indonesia to study the moving stripe abilities of broadclub cuttlefish (Sepia latimanus), he realised each individual could pull off different forms of camouflage, something Santon says is 鈥渧ery unusual鈥�.
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Over the months that followed, he and his colleagues filmed 98 cuttlefish pursuing prey 234 times. On some hunts, cuttlefish turned pale grey, extending an arm on each side, and flashed a dark stripe repeatedly down their body. At other times, they put two of their arms forward in a twisted cone shape and pulsed a black stripe down their arms.
Some also splayed all eight arms out in front of their body and turned a mottled yellow and orange to resemble a branched coral. Others mimicked a marine leaf by turning shades of olive green, sticking out their arms in three directions and slowly floating up and down.
Each technique probably has a different purpose, says Santon. His preliminary research suggests sliding stripes mask the cuttlefish鈥檚 approach or create enough visual noise to bamboozle prey. The leaf and coral camouflages may be attempts to look like non-threatening objects found in the ocean.
These displays could allow cuttlefish to approach prey faster and avoid being spotted by their own predators, says at the University of Minnesota, who wasn鈥檛 involved in the study.
But it is still unclear how cuttlefish decide which display to use and when. Their choices may depend on the surrounding environment or the type of prey they are hunting, or they might just use a random rotation of camouflage types to prevent other animals from learning their tricks.
奥补谤诲颈濒濒鈥檚 shows that their hunting strategy varies according to prey. He says it is 鈥渜uite possible鈥� that cuttlefish are also choosing their camouflage technique based on the meal they are pursuing.
Ecology
