MBARI’s Advanced Underwater Robots Capture Deep Sea Mother Squid Cradling Giant Eggs

MBARI's Advanced Underwater Robots Capture Deep Sea Mother Squid Cradling Giant Eggs
(Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Unknown author)

MBARI's advanced underwater robots, which included remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), caught a massive squid with giant eggs on camera.

Mother Squid With Giant Eggs Spotted by MBARI's Underwater Robots

In a new study, MBARI's ROV Doc Ricketts detailed the sighting of a mother squid with giant eggs during a 2015 expedition when he visited Mexico's Gulf of California. Although deep-sea squids have been seen by MBARI researchers brooding their eggs, the discovery was noteworthy since the eggs were twice as big as those of other brooding squids.

Researchers from the University of South Florida, GEOMAR's Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel, and MBARI carefully reviewed the ROV film. It looked at specimens of squids that looked similar to those obtained on earlier trips to the Gulf of California.

The team has concluded that this specimen most likely belongs to an unidentified Gonatidae family species that lays enormous eggs.

Per Henk-Jan Hoving, the principal author of this new study and a former MBARI postdoctoral fellow who now heads the deep-sea biology working group at GEOMAR, they still don't know enough about the squid that live in the deep water, even though they are fierce predators and an essential food source for many species, including people.

Squids play a significant role in the ocean. Using sophisticated underwater robots, the researchers gain new insights into the biology and behavior of deep-water squids and improve their understanding of their lives.

The research team was drawn to the squid because of its huge eggs, which measured about 11.6 millimeters (about a half inch) in diameter. Eggs half that tiny, with a maximum diameter of only six millimeters (approximately a quarter of an inch), were seen in previous encounters with brooding Gonatus squids.

In the deep sea's more stable and predictable environments, giant eggs might be more advantageous because they allow for a bigger investment in fewer offspring with a higher chance of surviving. Other deep-sea cephalopods, such as the pearl octopus (Muusoctopus robustus) and the warty deep-sea octopus (Graneledone sp.), have also been shown to exhibit this.

In addition, compared to other Gonatus squids, the squid in the Gulf of California brooded much fewer eggs. According to researchers, she was thought to be carrying between 30 and 40 eggs, but Gonatus squids have been known to brood up to 3,000 eggs at a time.

It is advantageous to lay many small eggs when there is a lot of predation or little food. A greater number of offspring increases the likelihood that at least some will survive in these settings.

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What Is Deep-Sea Gigantism?

Depp-sea creatures grow bigger than their counterparts, who don't live thousands of feet below the surface. The giant squid with giant eggs could probably be explained by deep sea gigantism.

Two general rules dictate deep sea gigantism -- Kleiber's and Bergmann's rule.

According to Kleiber's rule, bigger animals are frequently more fruitful. Because food is often scarce, giant animals that swim in the deep depths have every incentive to grow bigger and more proficient. These species rely on food that falls from the sky.

Bergman's rule is a common correlation between decreasing body temperature and increasing body mass. In cooler climates, larger populations and species are found, but in warmer climates, smaller populations and species are observed. However, this is not so much a law as it is a trend. Warm-blooded animals experience this because a larger animal has less area in contact with the environment relative to volume. However, this is connected to longer life spans and cell division in aquatic swimming organisms.