OMAHA, Neb. (KMTV) — This time on Zach at the Zoo, we head behind the scenes at the Scott Aquarium to get an up-close look at the giant pacific octopus and learn all about what makes them so incredibly unique.
- Greg is Omaha Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium's only giant pacific octopus.
- VIDEO: Zach shakes 'hands' with Greg.
- We get to help feed Greg some of his favorites
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Today – we are hanging out with one of the most fascinating animals in the sea.
“So we are with Greg, our giant pacific octopus,” Senior Aquarist Lindsey Condray introduced us.
“Despite her name, due to a fun confusion when we first got her, Greg is a female.”
Greg and Condray are pretty tight.
“They have excellent eyesight,” she explained. “They can recognize faces of people who interact with them a lot.”
But she had to feel me out a bit – literally.
“One of the other cool ways they recognize people besides eyesight is actually what she’s doing here. They can taste with their suckers. Each of these suckers is like its own little hand,” Condray said.
“So it’s about 2,000 little hands.”
Those little hands are pretty darn strong, too.
“The larger suckers can hold up to 30 pounds of weight per sucker,” Condray said.
Greg is very aware and intelligent.
“Octopuses are very curious, as you can definitely see here, very inquisitive.”
Condray continued, “They have long term memory, so they can remember things, they can make plans ahead — there’s actually some species of octopuses that have been documented to use tools.”
So how, and what, does Greg eat?
“So her mouth is underneath her where all those arms and suckers come together,” Condray explained. “She’s got a hard beak, like a parrot, that she can use to crack things open.”
“Mostly invertebrates, but we give her a variety of food — which can include squid, fish, crabs, clams, mussels, shrimp.”
These guys aren’t limited to the ocean. They can take to the land to find their next meal if need be.
“Octopuses can be out of the water and move around out of water. It’s thought for up to 30 minutes of time,” Condray said.
But for the most part – they want to stay where they’re familiar.
“They like to hang around in rocky crevices, little dens — they’re kind of home bodies. We actually used to try to keep octopuses in our bigger tanks and they never left like a three-foot area in that tank, and no one ever saw them,” Condray said.
“So we actually found they were more active and inquisitive when we had them in this rocky, cliffy sort of area, and we have a cave for her to go in and stuff for her to move around.”
You can visit Greg at her home inside the Scott Aquarium
