Welcome to our first Creature Feature post, our regular blog that gives you more details about the reef creatures featured on our products……and where better to start than the majestic, almost alien, octopus! This octopus, known commonly as the Caribbean Reef Octopus (Octopus briareus), is an eight legged cephalopod, a group that comprises arguably the most intelligent marine invertebrates on the planet. Like almost all cephalopods, the Caribbean Reef Octopus us pretty difficult to describe verbally as it can radically change its shape and colour to suit its surroundings. It can vary its skin texture from as smooth as silk, to bumpy and rough mimicking the rocks around it, and alter its colour from almost white to crimson and even black. It does this through specialised skin cells known as chromatophores which have small sacks of colour pigments inside that can be expanded and contracted. When not being used to blend in with their surroundings, these colours often reflect their mood, with white used to startle unwanted guests, and darker hues to warn that they might not be a particularly happy right now. They are also able to squeeze their bodies through holes that look impossible to enter, and are only limited by the size of the one ‘bone’ in their bodies, their beak.
More information on this truly amazing creature can be found here.
About Reef Creature Clothing
We specialise in not only coral reef inspired athleisure wear, but also beach & swim wear, and other printed products. All our colourful and vibrant designs are made using digitally enhanced prints of real underwater photographs taken in the Caribbean. We donate all of our profits after costs to The Coral Reef Research Hub, a small non-profit organisation that seeks to help fund research projects undertaken by early career coral reef scientists. The projects funded are those that aim to contribute information that will hopefully lead to legislative change, and thus help to protect coral reefs and their associated resources for generations to come!
We write these regular ‘creature features’ to help you learn more about the fascinating inhabitants of the coral reefs where our images came from. More will continue to be posted over the coming months so watch this space!