Squid, it's what's for dinner
In addition to having a wild sex life, the giant squid has interesting table manners. In an article on the Gut contents of a giant squid Architeuthis dux (Cephalopoda: Oegopsida) from New Zealand waters, investigators popped open the caecum of a captured giant squid and went rummaging about to see what they'd been eating. The toothsome contents are shown below.
Architeuthis is a deep water carnivore, so most of what was found is no surprise: remnants of fish and squid. A few other interesting tidbits emerged, though.
- One of the quirks of the invertebrate body plan is that having both a ventral nerve cord and a ventral mouth means that at some point the gut has to pass through its nervous system on the way out. Having your brain wrapped in a ring around your esophagus limits the size of what can be swallowed. This squid's esophagus had a maximum relaxed diameter of 10mm, while one of the chunks in its gut could be compressed to a minimum diameter of 19mm. The squid dictum, "Never eat anything bigger than the esophageal perforation through your brain" seems to have been ignored by Architeuthis.
- Some of the squid fragments in the gut could be identified by species…and they belonged to Architeuthis dux. Cannibals!!! Cool.
- It's possible that some of the Architeuthis fragments got there by accidental self-ingestion—you know, in the frenzy of eating, shoving things down your beak, you accidentally gnaw off an arm…and well, waste not, want not.
I know, it all sounds so horrific: great beasts in a feeding frenzy, ripping off hunks of friend, foe, and self alike, wolfing them all down without regard for safety or decorum. But then, I've sat down to dinner with two teenaged boys, so it all seems like business as usual to me.
(via Squidblog)
So does the brain stretch to fit larger chunks? I wonder what that feels like.