Octopus & Co. : die faszinierende Welt der Tintenfische, Kraken und Kalmare

by Roger Hanlon, Mike Vecchione, Louise Allcock

Faszination Tintenfisch: Alles über Krake, Octopus und Co.

Wussten Sie, dass Kraken ihr Eigenheim nicht nur zu Weihnachten schmücken? Oder dass sie Wege aus Labyrinthen finden können? Oder dass die meisten von ihnen einen Lieblingsarm haben? Gar nicht so einfach, wenn man acht Stück davon hat.

Tintenfische zählen zu jenen geheimnisvollen Meeresbewohnern, die den Menschen seit jeher faszinieren. Seit Jahrhunderten bevölkern sie Mythen und Legenden und geben Naturwissenschaftlern bis heute Rätsel auf. Tintenfische können viel mehr als Fußballergebnisse vorhersagen und spontan ihre Hautfarbe ändern. Die versierten Autoren Roger Hanlon, Luise Allcock und Mike Vecchione geben Ihnen in Octopus & Co. einen Einblick in die spannende Unterwasserwelt.

Tauchen Sie ein in die faszinierende Welt der Tintenfische, Kraken und Kalmare

Erfahren Sie in diesem umfangreichen Naturführer, wie Tintenfische ihre Farbe wechseln, wie sie sich fortpflanzen und trotz ihrer zum Teil plumpen Formen schwerelos durchs Wasser gleiten. Dieses Buch bietet fundiertes Wissen über die Gattung der Tintenfische anschaulich erklärt. Die breite Vielfalt verschiedener Spezies wird in detaillierten Steckbriefen vorgestellt.

Alle Infos finden Sie übersichtlich gegliedert in fünf aufschlussreichen Kapiteln:

• Erstaunliche Anatomie – wie „funktioniert“ ein Tintenfisch?
• 500 Millionen Jahre Evolution von lebenden Fossilien bis zum Klimawandel
• Tintenfisch-„Lifestyle“: So leben die Kopffüßer in verschiedenen Gewässern
• Kein Rückgrat, viel Köpfchen: Verhalten und Intelligenz von Krake, Sepia, Octopus und Kalmar
• Octopus und Mensch – Wie Tintenfische mit uns auskommen und was wir von ihnen lernen

Neben der Vielzahl an interessanten Fakten und neuem Wissen begeistert das Buch mit beeindruckenden Unterwasseraufnahmen von Octopoden, Kraken, Kalmaren und mehr. Holen Sie sich die faszinierende Welt der achtarmigen Wassertiere nach Hause!

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Biology, Nature, Animals, Reference

224 pages, Hardcover

First published July 25, 2018

Reviews

[Fred M · Rating 3 out of 5]

The pictures are gorgeous, but the text was a bit problematic

About a quarter of this book is devoted to gorgeous photos of these marvelous creatures. And for this reason, you would never want to view this book on a monochrome Kindle device. (I read this book on an iPad via a Kindle App.)

If all you want to do is look at pictures, the book’s an easy 5 stars. But three-quarters of the book is text (plus, for many specific species, world maps showing the range of their habitat). Just know the text is not geared for children. The vocabulary level of the basic text seemed tuned to these already somewhat familiar with the subject matter. And with the usage of the Latin names for many of the different species, much of this book actually was just a collection of abbreviated encyclopedic entries.

Part of the problem is that the diversity of species within these three classes of aquatic creatures (octopus, squid and cuttlefish) seemed enormous. So the more species the book discusses, the less words available to describe each species (to have a book of reasonable size). That’s why much of the book felt like an abbreviated reference book.

Yet buried within the text are many fascinating nuggets of information. One of the best: Octopuses have nine brains: one central brain and eight smaller brains, one in each arm.

Bottom Line: Nice photos. Not the easiest book to read. The overall organization of the book’s text seemed inconsistent, perhaps because this book has three authors.

[Danielle T · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hm, ok- nothing more intimidating than being the first written review of a book...!

Octopus, Squid, and Cuttlefish is like a more approachable version of Octopus: The Ocean's Intelligent Invertebrate with considerably more pictures and slightly less technicality. Unlike Octopus, the plethora of photographs keeps this from getting too dry, though the authors do note that many of the marvelous skin/chromatophore/idiophore changes are best seen in motion i.e. film. All three authors are researchers in the field (I've seen their work mentioned on cephalopod things over the years), and take care to mention when some conclusions aren't fully accepted by the community (for example, whether or not octopus 'play')

The book is divided into chapters by broad topic: Phylogeny & Evolution of cephalopods; Lifestyles including reproduction, development, movement, and biome; Behavior, Cognition & Intelligence on some of the ways we evaluate how smart they are; and Cephalopods & Humans on our interactions (fisheries, biomedical, inspiration). At the end of each chapter there are 6-9 profiles on different cephalopods, and it's a nice variety between octopods, squids, nautiluses, cuttlefish, and the sepiiids (as well as the Vampire, alone in its family group).

[Shainlock · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cephalopods have become one of the most interesting subjects to me in the last few years. They are simply amazing. The more I learn; the more fascinating they become. The Octopus for instance; They will reach out and touch you, communicate with you, form bonds of trust. I have seen it! Their abilities to alter texture, skin color and adapt to their environment have more than enthralled me lately. This is just one of the many books I came across that had some of my favorite creatures in it.

To be honest—they used to scare and repel me. Now I see them in a totally different light. Sir Attenborough, you helped a lot with that. Thank you. The idea of a giant squid is still terrifying but also thrilling too. So, give Cthulhu a chance. He’s not so bad. Just set boundaries. And Squidward is actually really funny.

Some of the things I used to dislike aren’t all that bad. You just have to see them for their uniqueness.
I went through the same thing with spiders.

[Michael Rodgers · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful book. Good balance between informative sections, and sections with photos of and facts about certain interesting species.

[Rebo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really loved this book. It’s more of a text book than a casual read, and yet the language is simple enough to enjoy outside of the classroom. I learned so much from this book, unlike the plankton one. It has both good pictures/diagrams and good explanations of the diff behaviors and unique physical features of cephalopods. I like how they have pages for some of the most important species, too.

It definitely got me much more interested in these incredible creatures, and I would love to read more, especially about squid and octopus…

[Joe Baldoni Karlik · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful book. It is very accessible, and the photos are gorgeous (I got this book both for information and as an artistic reference). I especially appreciated the manner in which zoomed in on certain representative species after each chapter, as this approach provided a general picture of cephalopod biology while also developing a rudimentary list of familiar species that can act as reference points in exploring the larger taxonomic diversity. This self-contained and accessible while providing enough depth that a fairly wide audience can learn something about the cephalopoda from it — I sure did.

My one complaint would be the last chapter on interactions between cephalopods and humans which frequently spoke very positively of quite violent exploitation of these animals by humans, which I think is simply wrong, and is really dissonant standing next to the rest of the book which revels in how wonderful cephalopods are (though this disconnect is not unique to this book and is pretty endemic to biological research).

[Sean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very well done book. Lots of vibrant color photos. The book intersperses individualized species discussion among chapters.
Ch1 Anatomy, + 8 species
Ch 2 Phylogeny and Evolution, + 8 species
Ch 3 Peculiar Lifestyles, + 8 species
Ch 4 Behaviour, Cognition and Intelligence, + 8 species
Ch 5 Cephalopods and Humans, + 8 species
Nice listing of books and websites under 'further resources'

[Faith La Belle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was in a ditch of not enjoying books. I decided to change things up and grab whatever books interested me at the library. I am thankful I did.

Though this books comes from an evolutionary standpoint on creation, which I disagree with, I appreciated seeing so much of God's creativity in his creations in this book.

[Vince · Rating 5 out of 5]

My wife and I found this exquisite book in a classic book-strewn shop in Silver City. We could not stop paging through and then reading and rereading it, drawn by the often iridescent images of these animals. The stories are both natural history extolling their so-interesting lives and deeper science of their development and evolution. The dust jacket alone was worth the price.

[Laney · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent resource to all things squid/octopus/ cuttlefish and more. It does read like a textbook. Reading it to my 6.5 year old. She only understands bits and pieces but still insists on having it read to her.

[Jolene Yaksich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing! Beautiful pictures to go with all the indepth information on these amazing animals.

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful book!

[Maddy Barnard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gorgeous photographs. The text was dense (more textbook like than casual read) and fun of specialized vocabulary.

[Rosemary Krystofolski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful book about cephalopods

Fascinating Book about Cephalopods that anyone interested in squids, octopuses or cuttlefish will really enjoy. This book has both wonderful text and gorgeous photos of beautiful species of squid, octopus, cuttlefish, nautilus and argonauts. I recommend this book very highly to anyone interested in the subject and it has wonderful easy to read text and plenty of very beautiful photos of so many gorgeous underwater creatures.

[Mills College Library]

564.5 H2419 2018