The Mimic Octopus (can it REALLY impersonate other animals?)

Coming up, Jonathan goes on a search for the elusive mimic octopus! Welcome to Jonathan Bird's Blue World! In the previous season of Blue World, I traveled to Dumaguete in the Philippines for a week diving with Atlantis Dive Resort in a search for an elusive octopus known as the Wonderpus. The Wonderpus is a rare master of disguise that lives in sandy habitats. But there is another, even harder to find octopus that lives in this same habitat—the mimic octopus. To find a mimic, I'm off again to the Philippines. But instead of Dumaguete, this time I'm heading to the rich biodiversity around Porto Galera. In the village of Sabang, nestled along the beach are a bunch of dive resorts. And I'm heading to my favorite—Atlantis. The facility is a luxury dive resort catering to discerning divers like me. It's nice. And most importantly, it's right on the water. As the crew readies our boat for the day, the divers set up their gear. I check my nitrox, and then our dive master Felix gives us a dive briefing. Well, I've been diving in a lot of places in the Philippines, but never Porto Galera. This will be my first dive here and I can't wait to see what we can find. They pull the boats right up on the beach for easy access. Today I get to share a boat with my good friends Howard and Michelle Hall, who are sporting their new Blue World hats. With our friend Ed Stetson and Zach-of-all-trades filming, we're off. After a short boat ride, Captain Tito helps us don our gear, and then… One, two, three, go! We're hunting for mimics. This sandy bottom might not look that exciting, but it's full of life. A school of striped catfish are feeding in the sand. Nearby, a seahorse, doing its best to look like algae. It's so easy to miss these little guys. You have to look closely at everything you see on the bottom. I move over to a small patch of coral to film some beautiful crinoids, which are plankton-feeding cousins of sea stars. Then I find a nudibranch that looks like it has a bunch of dreadlocks. And on the dreadlocks are little patches of algae called zooxanthellae. This nudibranch is literally called the solar-powered nudibranch, because it gets most of its energy from the sun in a symbiotic relationship with this algae. So it's literally a solar-powered animal. I catch the shape of two eyes. I look closer, thinking I've found my elusive mimic octopus, but it turns out to be a blue-spotted stingray hiding in the sand. It's amazing what you find when you're not looking for it. I stumble across a tiny wonderpuss. You can tell it's a wonderpuss because of its pencil-thin arms and orange-colored bands. Meanwhile, Howard is filming something intently, so I head over to see what he's found. Wouldn't you know it, he found a mimic octopus! It's easy to see how the mimic is confused with the wonderpuss. They both like to create banded patterns on their skin, and they are both small, living in the same habitat. But the mimic has more webbing between its arms and a browner coloration. But what makes the mimic so special is not how it looks, but how it acts. The mimic octopus gets its name because it likes to take on various shapes that some people think is mimicry. For example, when the mimic octopus travels across the sand, it takes on the shape and color of a flounder. A flounder is a flat fish that blends into the sea floor. It swims like a magic carpet, just above the sand. Is the mimic octopus trying to look like a flounder, or just taking on a shape which is universally effective for camouflage over sand? But not all of its behaviors are camouflage. Sometimes the mimic octopus dons stripes, and walks along with its arms sticking out like the spines of a lionfish. Is it trying to frighten away predators with a lionfish impersonation? Because this is definitely not camouflage. Sometimes the mimic swims quickly by adopting a torpedo shape. But it also puts on a display of stripes, making some biologists convinced it's trying to look like a venomous sea snake. The various shapes and patterns that the mimic octopus can adopt are very impressive. And because they are not all camouflage, there is evidence that the octopus is mimicking other animals to deter predators. The mimic octopus eats mostly crabs and fish. It hunts for food by investigating every hole in the sand with probing arms. The skinny little arms can fit way down into even the smallest burrows. Like most octopods, the mimic can create an ink cloud. This dark cloud is meant to distract predators. While a predator is attacking the dark and obvious ink, the octopus goes all pale and hard to see while it squirts away to safety. And when underwater cinematographers just get too annoying, the octopus can bury itself in the sand and hide. After spending nearly an hour breathing from my scuba tank, my ability to mimic a sea creature has reached an end, and it's time to head back to the boat. Porta Galera is a scuba diver's paradise, with a wide variety of marine life for underwater photographers and critter lovers. The mimic octopus and wonderpuss are just two of the exotic creatures to be seen here. The reefs contain a variety of healthy coral and marine animals. I could spend a month diving Porta Galera and never get bored. It's no wonder Porta Galera is so popular with divers. There's so much to see in a small area. It's one of the best places to see weird and wonderful critters in the Blue World. Hey Everyone! If you love Blue World and would like to help keep this great content coming, please consider making a donation to Oceanic Research Group's GoFundMe campaign. 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