CHALLENGE

[Steve O'Shea]

Sorry to keep texturing these things; the reasons will become all-too apparent in Tonmo time.

Attached is a radula (textured); nope, the earlier image is no radula; neither is it hook, shell nor of gladius origin. People have been warm .... but you'll need to do a lot of digging to find out what these structures are, because as far as I know they really haven't been reported in detail to date.

I don't want to tell you what it is, simply because it's an interesting way to learn about anatomy if you figure it out for yourself (boring if I blurt something out, don't you think?).

 

[spartacus]

I've been misquoted, I said archichoke not artichoke !

 

[Clem]

Exactly what is a radula?
What exactly is a 'denticle'?
What is the tongue of an Architeuthis (or any mollusc)?

Dear Steve,

Well...gah. Structures for pulping food and moving them down the gullet, I guess. If you didn't have grinding teeth or a radular tongue, you might want some kind of internal structure to grind up the food before it was digested.

Ah, I've got it, you found a Sarlacc.



Clem

 

[um...]

Is it a piece of the interior lining of the gizzard of a rainforest nautilus? Because that's what it looks like.

 

[HEAndrews]

guess

Hi this is definitely a guess, well first picture would have said radula but has it is not, i have no idea is the picture up side down lol. The second picture guess again is it some kind of cilia in the digestive tract.

 

[Steve O'Shea]

Hmmm, tongue was my only guess, same reference as Thom's (Richard Ellis book)... but I've got nothing else; I'm stumped... wonder what species this is... (request for hint fully embedded)

Hmmmmmm. Now that's a tough one Tony. It has me scratching my head too. It is from something that could loosely be referred to as Mastigoteuthis - but it is giant to the extreme, and very, very odd!

The radula image is from Nototodarus, but it too has these remarkable 'other' structures; in fact, octopus, squid, Spirula and vampyromorphs have these structures; bizarre nobody has drawn attention to them before.

Clem is near boiling. You lot are rather switched on you know! A pleasure it is to tease you

 

[Fujisawas Sake]

So what is it? The lining of the stomach or the crop?

Or is it an omasum or abomasum? Maybe a ruminant squid? :P

(Oh, and Steve? No need to worry about me... Just a quote from one of my favorite book series - been following it for nigh-on 15 years now) :P

Sushi and Lobstrosities,

John

 

[spartacus]

John, the idea of a ruminant squid is awesome given my other hobby which is llama envy. If anyone else out there is a frustrated llama yearner, here's the world's most handsome llama.

sorry to go off piste but it wasn't me who said ruminant 1st.

 

[ant]

maybe its a undersea sarlacc

 

[Jean]

The radula image is from Nototodarus, but it too has these remarkable 'other' structures; in fact, octopus, squid, Spirula and vampyromorphs have these structures; bizarre nobody has drawn attention to them before.

Clem is near boiling. You lot are rather switched on you know! A pleasure it is to tease you

Now that just makes me :x (at me!) you'd think with number of Nototodarus I've seen I would recognise that!!!!!!!!! My only excuse (weak as it may be) is that I'm not a taxonomist....gonna have to pull one from the freezer and have a look.....so much for writing papers today!

J

 

[Jean]

&*$^#^%$#& This is driving me mad........no I haven't thawed a squid I REALLY have to be writing papers ....but all I can see are little dentically bits

myABSOLUTELY last (well until next time) guess......

The inner surface of the crop?????????

J (off to write now!)

 

[thom]

I found a reference to small "multicuspid tubercles" on the mantle, head, and pretty much all over the place on some Mastigoteuthis....
This challenge is a bit over my head i'm afraid, being an art person and all, but it's very interesting! You should do this more often steve! It seems to get everyone reading up

 

[Steve O'Shea]

&*$^#^%$#& This is driving me mad........no I haven't thawed a squid I REALLY have to be writing papers ....but all I can see are little dentically bits

myABSOLUTELY last (well until next time) guess......

The inner surface of the crop?????????

Jean, if you've got denticles in your crop then it makes what I've been talking about (in the first Fig) quite insignificant! Now you'll have me dissecting one of these things ... I'd be blown away if I found tooth-like structures there ... I've dreamt of finding gizzard-like plates, but have yet to happen upon one. Denticles would be the next best thing!

The aforementioned are not from the crop - but you're all on the right track. The reason why you haven't hit upon it yet is because nothing has been written about them (just a very rare casual observation of them every now and then ....).

 

[Jean]

&*$^#^%$#& This is driving me mad........no I haven't thawed a squid I REALLY have to be writing papers ....but all I can see are little dentically bits

myABSOLUTELY last (well until next time) guess......

The inner surface of the crop?????????

Jean, if you've got denticles in your crop then it makes what I've been talking about (in the first Fig) quite insignificant! Now you'll have me dissecting one of these things ... I'd be blown away if I found tooth-like structures there ... I've dreamt of finding gizzard-like plates, but have yet to happen upon one. Denticles would be the next best thing!

The aforementioned are not from the crop - but you're all on the right track. The reason why you haven't hit upon it yet is because nothing has been written about them (just a very rare casual observation of them every now and then ....).

Sorry, Steve....but I was guessing!!!!!! I haven't investigated the crop that thoroughly! Gotta go teach kiddies about now so won't be investigating today!

J

 

[Architeuthoceras]

Taking a WAG here, are those things the contents of a crop

Maybe a huge squid, eating sharks, and those are Megalodon teeth, and the pic is downsized so 6" = 1mm