Schneier on Security

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September 21, 2007

Friday Squid Blogging: Whale Eating Giant Squid

"We looked hard and saw a tentacle of a squid hanging from its mouth and there were other pieces of squid stuck to the whale’s body. It made a number of brusque movements on its side in the water to free the tentacle to eat it – and there we were filming and photographing it all."
He reckoned the squid could have been some five metres long, a comparatively modest size for the species. Examples have been found which reach 20 metres in length and weigh in at a thousand kilos!

Posted on September 21, 2007 at 4:05 PM • 9 Comments • View Blog Reactions

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Comments

It would be interesting to give these whales some sort of high-sensitivity cameras or other image recording device that would work in the dark, deep waters so they can bring us live footage of their hunting immersions.

Posted by: jkohen at September 21, 2007 4:50 PM

"I'm in ur sea, eatin ur whalez!"

Posted by: Lolsquid at September 21, 2007 5:22 PM

Pooh. It's only a pilot whale---I was expecting a sperm whale.*

Nonetheless, this is Really Cool (tm). A strong, if circumstantial, hypothesis gets about the best evidence possible.

* I have to admit my ignorance came into play here. I'd always thought of pilot whales as a sort of overgrown dolphin, hanging out near the surface. I had no idea that they can get down to 1.2 km, and can stay down for over 20 minutes. (The article says they can ``only'' stay down 22 mins. Such a letdown.)

Posted by: Terry Cloth at September 21, 2007 5:26 PM

Oops---insufficient fact checking. The article says ``... staying down for no more than 22 minutes at a time.'' Sounds dismissive to me, but `only' isn't in there.

Posted by: Terry Cloth at September 21, 2007 5:31 PM

Aw, man! Where's the video? :o(

Posted by: Wicked Lad at September 21, 2007 8:36 PM

"Aw, man! Where's the video?"

I know. I looked all over the Internet for it.

Posted by: Bruce Schneier at September 22, 2007 1:46 AM

> "I'm in ur sea, eatin ur whalez!"

Well, I misunderstood the headline at first too, the lego grammar of English sometimes gets in the way. Probably should be:

"I'm in ur sea, eatin ur squidz!"

Because obviously it's not the giant squid who is a whale eater.

Posted by: betabug at September 22, 2007 3:37 AM

Cool, I've been on holiday down there a few times and seen the pilot whales in action. Never seen a squid though except on my plate.