Circus octopus

Scientists witnessed the octopus picking up pieces of coconut shells and turning them into shelters.

Octopus just rubbed coconut shell and "ran" very fast.Photo: BBC.

"I almost choked because I laughed when I saw this scene for the first time. I knew the octopus would do something when it came close to two pieces of coconut shell, but I couldn't imagine it grabbing them and running." Dr. Julian Finn, a scientist from Victoria Museum, Australia, said.

National Geographic said that Finn and his colleagues watched and filmed 20 coconut octopus (Amphioctopus marginatus) in Indonesian waters since 1999. They witnessed them "circulating" with coconut shells 4 times.

If there is only one coconut shell, the octopus will overturn the shell and then come under.Photo: National Geographic .

In the video above, after snapping the coconut shell with all 8 limbs, the octopus blew the mud from the shell and hugged the shell while "running". The animal runs about 20 m with coconut shell.

"I couldn't expect that the soft limbs of the octopus could help them move as fast as spiders. That's a great coordination between the limbs and their sucking senses , " BBC quoted Mark Norman, director of science. Study of the Victoria Museum, comment.

But if there are two coconut shells, the animal will let them turn upside down and then slip into the middle.Photo: National Geographic.

Scientists believe octopus must "run" very quickly because they are very vulnerable to attack while rubbing coconut shells. If only one shell was found, the octopus would overturn the shell and hide below. But when there are two shells, it will crawl into a shell and cover up the other shell. The coconut shells help protect octopus in the seafloor with too little space to hide.

"If they only hide in the mud that is not covered by anything above, predators will easily detect them. Because the body has no bones, octopus is always a prey for predators." Norman explained.