Idiosepius pygmaeus

Posted on January 3, 2014 by annabelle No Comments

This beautiful little Pygmy Squid (probably Idiosepius pygmaeus) is only about 1cm long with tiny circular fins at the rear end, and longer tentacles that extend from shortish arms at the front of the animal. Feeding on tiny shrimps and crabs, it’s said that the squid sneaks up on shrimp and immobilises them by biting through the nerve chord.

This little squid is thought to be assosciated with seagrass meadows and mangroves, with a range from northern Australia through the Indo-west Pacific to the South China Sea.

Individuals are more active at night when they can be found near the surface, and live for approximately 80 days.  An  interesting feature of this little squid is its ability to glue sand to its body as a camouflage.

Spotlighting just on dusk from the roof of our houseboat, I spotted this little fellow in the water next to the boat.  As the squid was so tiny and moving around in the water, we scooped him into a clean bowl of seawater for the photograph, taken in Camden Sound in 2007.

Image © Kimberley Media 2014

A Pymy squid (Idiosepius sp.)

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