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"A
mysterious sea creature, up
to 7 feet long, weighing up
to 100 pounds, with
thousands of sharp barbs on
its arms. It hunts in packs
of hundreds, flying through
the water at 25 mph,
changing color.
With a parrotlike beak and strong arms, it
attacks and tries to eat nearly anything it
sees, including fish, scuba divers, even its
own kind.
But it’s not a creature of Hollywood. It’s
real. And it’s reached the Monterey Bay. The
Humboldt squid, also known as the giant
squid or jumbo squid, traditionally has
lived in warm waters off South America and
Mexico, where fishermen call it “diablo rojo,”
or “red devil.”
For reasons that still aren’t entirely
clear, large numbers of the scrappy
cephalopods have been steadily expanding
their range north, first off San Diego and
Los Angeles, where hundreds have washed up
on beaches in recent years.
Now they appear to have taken up residence
in Monterey Bay, according to a study
released today by researchers from Stanford
University and the Monterey Bay Aquarium
Research Institute (MBARI) compiled with
more than 16 years of underwater video (see
video clip above).
“These are aggressive, pugnacious bullies,”
said Bruce Robison, senior scientist at
MBARI, based in Moss Landing. “They are a
sight to behold.”
The invasion has
sparked the interest of recreational
fishermen, who fight to land them like
marlin. It has piqued the curiosity of some
chefs, who say they can be cooked like
conventional calamari. And it has drawn wary
attention from fisheries biologists, who are
concerned that the voracious invertebrates
could deplete commercial fisheries such as
hake, known as Pacific whiting, a common
ingredient in frozen fish sticks, or
rockfish, which are sold in restaurants as
“red snapper.”
“When it moves into an area, it can
potentially have drastic impacts,” said
Louis Zeidberg, a postdoctoral researcher at
Stanford’s Hopkins Marine Station in Pacific
Grove. “We’ve yet to see how that is going
to play out, but it could change things.”
Tom Mattusch of El Granada runs recreational
fishing trips on his 53-foot charter boat,
the Huli Cat, based in Half Moon Bay.
“This is like the creature from the black
lagoon. They are very strange looking,” he
said with a chuckle. “Nobody here has ever
caught anything like this.
“They fight so much, they are a real bear to
pull in,” he added. “I’ve seen big heavy
construction workers, after catching two or
three, look like they’ve been worked over by
a prize fighter.”
Zeidberg and Robison
concluded that the Humboldt squid have
become a permanent presence in Monterey Bay
since about 2002. They published their
findings this week in Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, a scientific
journal.
The duo reviewed video footage that Robison
and other researchers shot around Monterey
Bay from more than 3,000 dives with unmanned
submersibles back to 1991.
They didn’t see any Humboldt squid until
1997. Then, during an El Niño year — when
Pacific waters warm and currents change —
they noticed some, but the animals
disappeared. There were only one or two a
year spotted until 2002, another mild El
Niño year. But after that, the squid, which
live to be only one or two years old, were
seen on almost every dive.
Because the squid dive as deep as 3,000 feet
and have been filmed hunting krill,
lanternfish, hake and other animals in a
wide temperature range from 37 degrees in
Monterey Bay to 90 degrees in Mexico’s Sea
of Cortez, Robison and Zeidberg say they
don’t think global warming or other
temperature changes are driving the
expansion.
Instead, they suspect that the squid’s range
has expanded because fishing has reduced the
populations of predators such as large tuna,
marlin and swordfish that eat them in their
natural range off South America. Similarly,
some smaller species of tuna, which compete
with squid for food, also have been reduced.
“It’s an indication that, looking at the
entire Pacific Ocean, things are out of
whack,” said Zeidberg.
“You’ve got this sort of weird species
spreading out into areas that it has never
really taken up residence before,” he said.
“It’s an indication the overall health of
the ocean is not as good as it should be. We
need to figure out exactly what is causing
this range expansion and find some kind of
political or economic solution.”
The Humboldt squid is named after an ocean
current off South America that was
documented by naturalist Alexander von
Humboldt. With the scientific name Dosidicus
gigas, Humboldt squid are roughly six times
the size of common market squid, Loligo
opalescens, a 1-foot species commonly found
off the California coast and sold as
calamari.
Zeidberg said some restaurants, such as
Rosines in Monterey, have begun to put
Humboldt squid on the menu.
“A lot of people find it kind of tough and
kind of gamy compared to traditional
calamari, but I like it,” he said.
“They make big steaks out of them.”
Mattusch, the charter boat operator, said
anglers drop up to 1,000 feet of line in
water 20 miles off Half Moon Bay and catch
the animals on a 20-inch-long metal barbed
jig that has glow-in-the-dark plastic lures.
When they are pulled into the boat, they can
spray water and ink up to 20 feet in the
air. Sometimes hundreds of other squid
surround the boat, attacking the hooked
squid.
“Picture something the size of your doormat
outside your front door,” he said. “And an
inch thick. That’s how much meat you get out
of them.”
Mattusch, who also fishes for rockfish,
salmon and other species, said fees for
squid fishing — he charges $75 a person —
have helped supplement his income. But he’s
nervous their appetites might cut into other
fishing.
“The shallowest I’ve seen them is 300 feet,”
he said. “That scares the hell out of us
because these things eat so much. They are
eating rockfish, hake and shrimp,
lanternfish, anchovy, sardine — and actually
they eat each other.”
The squid are not to be confused with a
species of giant squid known as Architeuthis
dux that can grow up to 60 feet. Those are
the stuff of “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under
the Sea” and other fantastic stories. Last
year, for the first time, a 30-foot giant
squid was filmed off Japan, although none
has ever been filmed in Monterey Bay, said
Robison.
Humboldt squid have attacked divers filming
documentaries in Mexico, dislocating the
shoulder and tearing the wetsuit of one. So
do California divers and swimmers need to
worry?
“I don’t really think they are going to want
to get into the water where people are,”
Zeidberg said, noting their deep-water
habits. “It doesn’t seem like there’s enough
food for them, and that’s not their normal
habitat.”
But, he said, they sure can get imaginations
racing. “It’s not a coincidence,” he joked,
“that a lot of the space aliens in movies do
seem to look like squid.” |
