Why do octopuses change color

The first is in their arms - even though they can't see colour, they can feel it no jokes. Using chemicals called opsins in tiny fibres on their arms, octopuses can sense colour by the changes in the wavelengths of light reaching these receptors. Their second trick is those weirdly shaped pupils. Photographers have heard of chromatic aberration , a distortion of colours in a photo when the lens fails to focus all the colours in an image correctly at the same time. Octopuses, squids and cuttlefish use their weird eyes to exploit this phenomenon, they break up light and then focus on different parts of it separately - even though all they see is grey, they "know" what colour it is because of know much it bent.

No other animal does anything like this! So to wrap up, here's how an octopus camouflages: It uses its eyes to see the darkness, texture and layout of a scene. Its pupils distort light to get a rough idea of colour. That info is sent from its brain to the eight arm-brains that add colour information from their tiny fibres. The arms then decide how to tint, deflect and scatter light, while the main brain keeps the system in order. Its skin matches the texture of the surroundings, and the octopus moves into a position to blend in better.

If that's not the ultimate ocean superpower, we don't know what is! Plan Your Trip. Special Offers. Online Resources. Things To Do. School Lessons and Outreach. When these small octopuses are provoked, iridescent blue rings surrounding dark brown patches appear all over their bodies.

Cephalopods can also use chromatophores to communicate with one another. Male Caribbean reef squid Sepioteuthis sepioidea turn red to attract females and white to repel other males—and can even split the coloration of their bodies down the middle to attract a female on one side and repel a male on the other! This flashing is suspected to be a means of communication—but no one knows what the squid are trying to say.

Skip to main content. The blue-lined octopus may be small, growing to at most 15 cm, but it can be deadly: its venom can cause breathing failure in humans as well as other animals. Tony Brown, Flickr. This day octopus Octopus cyanea has shaped itself like algae or some coral so hide from predators or stalk prey. Flickr user Pudekamp. Believe it or not, the secret to an octopus changing color is hidden within their skin.

More specifically, octopuses have special cells called chromatophores in their skin. Within these cells are sacs that contain a pigment, ranging in color. The sacs can carry pigments that are black, red, yellow, or brown. Well, when the muscles around these cells tighten, the pigment sacs expand and are stretched a bit wider. This means it is easier to see more pigment on the skin of the octopus. When the muscles relax again, the pigment sacs are no longer stretched and the skin is less pigmented.

The sacs are controlled by nerves and muscles, so as you can imagine, it takes quite a bit of energy for these animals to change color. In addition to changing color, octopuses can also change their shape and the texture of their skin. This means they are able to look like rocks and even other kinds of animals! Oftentimes, this means there is a predator nearby. To avoid being eaten, an octopus will change its color to blend into the background or texture to do the same.

Though octopuses can expel ink to escape danger, changing color and texture is their greatest form of defense as they do not have any other physical protection. Specifically, octopuses can be quite vulnerable due to their soft, malleable bodies. Similarly, some octopuses will mimic the appearance of another animal to deter their predator.

Lastly, some octopuses will change color to stand out. Certain colors and patterns within the animal kingdom signal something dangerous or even poisonous, so some octopuses will warn other animals to not even think about eating them.