Ocotpus listed by size - HELP

[kiltcrazy]

OK, I'm a frustrated Mom of an 8th grade student. He's interested in Marine Biology and chose this subject for a science project in which they are to build their own periodic table of elements using a subject they are interested in. They have to have 8 families with 4 rows. So he is doing the mullusca family listing four of each sorted by size as he sees the periodic table being sorted. The teacher also wants their table to be visually pleasing so he wants pictures of each as well. We've had great luck with others such as Cuttlefish, squid, Nidibranchs... But when it came to Octopus all articles list two largest Octopus and that's it!

He needs four.

We have spent at least 4 hours now searching articles including very scientific articles and have found nothing to help him find the last two he needs in order of size.

Can anyone help?

Thanks for any help in advance.

Veronica and Jake

 

[robyn]

Well, I'm not an expert on octopus species, but how about a dwarf species (mercatoris, digueti?) and a midsize type like Octopus briareus?

try googling for the specific names using image search and you should find some very nice pictures. Good luck!

 

[esquid]

which octos do you have listed already?

 

[esquid]

Also, does the smallest of the octos need to larger than the largest of the previous row? If so, what size is that?

 

[gholland]

This pdf lists sizes of many species:

ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/009/ac479e/AC479E32.pdf

 

[kiltcrazy]

which octos do you have listed already?

We have the largest Octo as the North Pacific Giant Octo at 4.3 meters

and the Seven-arm octo at 2.9 meters

 

[Steve O'Shea]

Hmmmmmm

I'd try this:
Haliphron atlanticus (largest)
Enteroctopus dofleini (2nd largest)
Enteroctopus zealandicus (3rd largest)
... and possibly Enteroctopus megalocyathus (4th largest)

That 4th one is a problem one. (Note, Enteroctopus features as a genus with many of the largest of octopus species.)

Check out this link (click here), or if you want the final published article, click here and scroll to the bottom of the screen where you'll find a link to download the article in full.

 

[kiltcrazy]

Thanks for all the help!

I just wanted to tell everyone who replied thank you for all the help. I think my son spent a majority of his weekend reading articles meant for people in the field and not meant for an 8th grade student, but he learned a lot!

As he has asprations of becoming a marine biologist, I guess this gives him an idea of what he will be seeing and doing in the future if he sticks to his chosen path.

I would like to suggest that someone help out Wikipedia in the Octopus department!

Thanks again,
Veronica and Jake

 

[monty]

It sounds like you're done, but I had another thought on a "popular if not taxonomic" variant: You could list the 4 largest octopus families rather than species... I'm guessing they would be Haliphron, Enteroctopus, Pinnoctopus, and Tremoctopus, but I may be forgetting another large family. Some of the Octopus species get large as well, of course, but my guess is that they're ranked 5 in terms of largest member, and I don't know the cirrate octos that well. I'm not sure how large Eledone gets, either. Anyway, just a thought I had.

 

[Steve O'Shea]

You could list the 4 largest octopus families rather than species... I'm guessing they would be Haliphron, Enteroctopus, (insert Ocythoe), Pinnoctopus, and Tremoctopus, but I may be forgetting another large family.

I just inserted Ocythoe in their Mark; the female of this species grows HUGE!