Ok, so you've heard of marine animals such as the octopus and even cuttlefish being able to change colour, but I bet you didn't know that for a certain species of cuttlefish, this ability of theirs is so developed that their appearance change can fool their mates as well?
Anyone recognise this strange-looking big fella? I thought it looked quite gentle here in this video actually. Haha. Ok anyway, introducing the Australian Giant Cuttlefish! ( Sepia apama).
SO, what is so fascinating about this fella? Get ready to be surprised! ;)
Basically, some of the smaller-sized males of these big creatures can change their appearance so rapidly that they not only fool their competing male counterparts into thinking that they are female during intense mating competition, hence allowing these mimickers to get closer to the females, but the females themselves, for some reason, actually allow these mimickers to fertilise their eggs! Sneaky little biggies aren't they? Haha.
AND that is not all. According to this ScienceDaily article, ( you can read the full article here), “the cuttlefish can switch between a male and female appearance 10-15 times per minute.” It's no wonder that the bigger males and even the females themselves get confused!
Such behaviour is actually known as “sneak-mating”, which can take the forms of both overt sneak-mating as well as stealth sneak-mating. Of course, the cuttlefish employs all available tools in its arsenal, and that includes the well documented sexual mimicry as well. The latter often “leads to increased acceptance of mating with the female, and to immediate fertlisation, as demonstrated by DNA fingerprinting.” Now I know, the mimicries of animals have so many different purposes!
I couldn't exactly find a video of a smaller male switching its appearance so rapidly, but here is one video of a close-up of skin patterning changes, although by the same scientist who conducted the research mentioned above. There is one here on youtube of giant cuttlefish courtship too! You can clearly see the rapid colour and pattern changes in the male cuttlefish for this one. ;)
This post and all the relevant research that I did was actually inspired by a little chameleon I saw while in school yesterday. While the chameleon was,of course, not as flamboyant as the cuttlefish in changing colour, the distinct two half colours of a brownish-orange and green while it froze beside a tree root and stared right back at me made me wonder if it could change colour at will, or was it because of its surroundings that acted as some external stimuli. While I ended up not finding out the answer to that yet, I stumbled across a few magnificent videos of the flamboyant cuttlefish ( metasepia pfefferi) and became fascinated by cuttlefish instead. So I turned my focus to camouflage by the creatures of the deep instead, and voila! I think, the Australian Giant Cuttlefish certainly tops the list for fully maximising this colour changing ability. :)
References
a. Image used from http://achtel.com/Australian%20Giant%20Cuttlefish.jpg
b. It Pays To Be An Imposter. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 21, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2005/01/050124005322.htm
c. Encyclopedia of Life, http://www.eol.org/taxa/16486539?category_id=194#
d. Youtube, Giant Cuttlefish of the Kelloe, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0zFMb160EI
e. Youtube, Giant Cuttlefish Courtship, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxiH3f-JsO4