It’s an octopus-eat-octopus world. Scientists have discovered that mating, male blue-lined octopuses will inject a powerful, ...
Some male octopuses tend to get eaten by their sexual partners, but male blue-lined octopuses avoid this fate with help from ...
Male blue-lined octopuses inject a powerful neurotoxin into the hearts of females before mating to avoid being eaten, ...
Animals have evolved many different ways of protecting themselves, from prickly quills and razor-sharp teeth to clever ...
"Mating ended when the females regained control of their arms and pushed the males off," the researchers noted.
Learn more about the mating of blue-lined octopuses — a treacherous ordeal involving sex, cannibalism, and sedation.
Now, researchers studying the octopuses have learned that not only do male blue-lined octopuses use their venom against enemies, but also against members of their own species — cannibalistic females.
The male octopus of this species precisely injects a dose of its deadly tetrodotoxin venom into the females to immobilise them during copulation, say researchers at the University of Queensland.
Male blue-lined octopi (Hapalochlaena fasciata) have been found to use venom on their sexual partners, as well as for the ...
Their venom is called neurotoxin tetrodotoxin, or TTX, and is created by bacteria that live in a symbiotic relationship with the octopuses. The toxin is stored in their salivary glands ...