The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus

2002-08-27: "I have seen a tree octopus!"

Dear sir,

I am a canopy researcher currently based in Tasmania, Australia. I came your web site and was very excited, for cephalopods are another dear interest of mine. I would like to share a photograph with you. I spent last June studying in the coniferous forests of Mt. St. Helens and Rainier for an international canopy network project mapping trees. ICAN is based out of the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. We would climb the trees each day and measure branching structure.

Photo detail enhanced using advanced ZPi cephalopod-image processing technology.

I saw it from above, on rope at perhaps 30 meters. It was maybe 12 meters below me. This was in early August 2001. I will scan my files for other pictures and see if I can locate another one of these elusive camouflaged creatures. I also invite you to visit my University of Tasmania web page at www.geog.utas.edu.au/yoav and browse.

I invite you to post this photograph on your web page. It would be an honour to be included on such a site about such an amazing and little known creature. The photograph is also at the bottom of the linkage page on my web site. Is this the first confirmed sighting of one of these creatures outside of the Olympics? If you suspect that it is a seperate subspecies, I propose it be named Octopus paxarbolis var. cascadii. Slightly better than naming it after myself, I think.

[...] If you have any suggestions on how to integrate a Tree Octopus research program into my study, please let me know. My project proposal is available on the web site. I suspect that there is an analogous creature in the eucalyptus rainforests of SE Australia. I will find them if I can!

Also, I still haven't seen the giant squid at the museum that washed ashore a few miles from here. But I will....

Cheers!

Yoav Daniel Bar-Ness

2002-12-21: "Tree Octopus Sighting!!!!"

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I was recently taking pictures of the beautiful scenery while on vacation, when I noticed something odd crawling through the trees. To my disbelief, I discovered that it was a tree octopus! It moved extremely quickly, but I managed to get a good picture of it, and I think you'll agree that it's a pretty high-quality photo. I hope you add this picture to your site so that people can see the beauty of the tree octopus.

Sincerely,
Jonathan

2003-06-04: "Possible Tree Octopus Sighting!"

Photo detail enhanced using advanced ZPi cephalopod-image processing technology.

I was hiking with my Aunt Gene last August in the Hoh rain forest when I shot this slide. It wasn't until a few months later, when I was giving a slide presentation, that I noticed the mass in the upper left [sic] corner. I thought it appeared a little strange, but it wasn't until I stumbled across your site that I realized that I had found an elusive tree octopus! I feel so lucky to have accidentally gotten a photo of this amazing creature!

-- Justin

2004-02-11

I am well acquainted with the tree octopus from the time I lived in Tacoma. For a time I dated a girl who lived in Port Angeles on the north end of the Olympic peninsula. Because it was a about a three hour I'd drive up to visit her on the weekends. The route I'd drive to and from visiting her crossed the Hood canal and then followed its western shore for some distance. It's a beautiful, unspoiled area of virgin forest at the foot of the majestic Olympic mountains in the west, and the beautiful waters of the Hood canal and Puget sound to the east. Many times while driving back home late I would see tree octopi (or "tree squawbs" as the locals call them) as they crossed the road heading for the canal, obviously on their way back to spawn... (Read more on the Louisville Scuba Divers website.)

2004-10-29: "Tree Octopus Sighting East of Seattle!"

Photo detail enhanced using third-party cephalopod-image processing technology.

A friend an I were looking for interesting bugs in a dense forest east of Seattle. My friend John is the man hanging from a rope in the middle of the photo. I was taking a picture of him hanging from the ropes with my digital camera when I noticed in the picture preview there was something on the base of one of the trees. I Looked at the tree and saw what appeared to be an octopus. It was rather dark because the sun was on the other side of the tree, so I took a photo of it with my heat sensing camera to make sure that it was a living creature. I then went searching on the internet for a tree-climbing octopus site and I found this one. Here is the photo I was talking about, I hope it helps your studies.

Sincerely,
Peter Rootes

2005-04-28: "Tree-ringed octopus sighted with koalas"

Photo detail enhanced using third-party cephalopod-image processing technology.

At last! Someone who can testify to the reality of such rare and beautious beasts.

It was a fine Spring day. We hapless residents of Daisy Hill were out photographing the last remaining large koala habitat in SE Queensland, with developers poised at our doorstep (www.savedaisyhill.com), snapping away at the innocent koalas sleeping peacefully in the treetops, when lo! The great and very endangered Tree-ringed octopus appeared swinging amongst the branches. Very unusual for such a shy animal.

Developers are still poised at our doorstep. We know our plight to save the Tree-ringed octopus is futile, but this, at least, is testimony to the world that they once inhabited this great land.

Hapalochlaena eucalyptlata, which is known to grow up to 30cm (12 in) across bears bright blue rings when angered, and can inflict a lethal bite, much like it's marine cousin, the lesser Hapalochlaena lunulata.

Since both species carry enough poison to kill 26 adults within minutes, we're hoping there'll be enough to go around for the developers and their bulldozer wielding lackeys.

Sonny Whitelaw

2006-12-16

Photo detail enhanced using advanced ZPi cephalopod-image processing technology.

Here is a rare and endangered Cephalopod Thuja Pilcata or locally known as the Western Red Cedar Climbing Octopus. You don't see one of these babies everyday!! Especially this far inland!!

Emacs!

2006-12-31

Your write up was very impressive but you failed to mention the decline in habitat here in Southern Oregon due to logging. Fortunately, now that the species is protected, you often hear in the woods " Don't cut that one, they's one of them dang blue pusses up there!!"

A far greater threat to the species exists from pets. I have personally witnessed a Labrador Retriever violently shaking a Cedar Pus, the cries of which are unimaginable, perhaps best described as unworldly or maybe Chinese.

On a lighter note I'm sure you will be happy to hear our sighting turned out to be a breeding colony, as evidenced by the attached photo.

2007-08-24: "Invasive exotic tree octopus species a threat to our native Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus?"

Dear Sir,

I am writing to bring to your attention yet another threat to our endangered native Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus (Octopus paxarbolis). I photographed these specimens on a potted bamboo and Japanese maple on my deck, north of Seattle.

At this time, I am uncertain whether this invader is the Chinese Bamboo Octopus (Sinoctopus bambusa) that came in on the bamboo and spread to the nearby Japanese maple, or a related Japanese species (Aceroctopus japonicum) that spread from the maple to the bamboo. Given the similarity between the coloring of the octopuses and the maple leaf stems, I suspect the latter.

The Asiatic invasive octopus is much smaller than O. paxarbolis, with mature specimens measuring just 5-6 inches across, from tentacle tip to tentacle tip. However, what they lack in size, they make up for in numbers. The maple and bamboo plants were just crawling with them! Lax inspection standards for horticultural imports are certainly to blame.

I worry about the effect on the native species should the exotic species manage to spread beyond garden plants to the greater fir forests of the area.

Sincerely,
Jonathan Griffin-MacGregor