This newly discovered big-eyed squid looks so goofy that it could easily be a character in Finding Nemo. The vivid purple color and especially those huge, widely spaced eyes gives this animal such a comical appearance that researchers couldn’t help but giggle when they first stumbled across this bizarre animal.
In fact, the discoverers of the cartoonish creature actually thought for a moment that they might be looking at a toy which had made its way to the bottom of the ocean. But upon closer inspection it became clear that this purple people eater is not an octopus, but a species of short-armed cephalopod called a stubby squid.
The googley eyed squid was filmed off the coast of southern California at a depth of 900 meters, or just under 3,000 feet. This animal is a Rossia pacifica which looks like a cross between a squid and an octopus, but is actually more closely related to cuttlefish. We see the similarities between this stubby squid and bobtail squids of tropical waters, with which it shares the peculiar behavior of burrowing into sand with only its eyes peering out – and what a pair of eyes this guy has!
