Octopus and Soap

[enchantmentdivi]

I've been pondering this all day long, and to say that I'm a little irritated would be a major understatement. I have loads to say about this for so many reasons, but I'll just touch on one point....

....I wonder if they realize that what they are doing is equivalent to torturing a puppy by cutting off its ears? Or by sticking a firecracker in a cat's behind and lighting it? Or poking the eyes out of a hamster? It's animal abuse...plain and simple.

Squirting soap into an octo's den is accosting it with an irritant that burns them. Burns their gills, burns their flesh, and potentially in the end, kills them. The death may not be immediate, but rather slow and painful. That same soap also kills other creatures sharing the same dens.

Ugh, I'm disgusted. I'll stop there.

[Pez7378]

I just have one small piece of advice for the divers that are planning this unprovoked attack on our Octos.....

If things go bad..........


Just protect your mask and let him have his way with you!

[Sounder]

I sincerely hope those members of our board whom this thread is about have read this and hopefully have elected to change their plan.

[gcbryan]

Maybe you shouldn't discuss that you think the Aquarium uses irritants here then eh... Not like it matters much what commercial fishing or scientific collection permits allow. Its illegal for sport divers to use irritants, period.

You're the one who seems intent on continuing this discussion. Someone asked what tricks the Aquarium used to capture GPO's and I simply said that unfortunately one of their tricks is using something similar (not soap of course). It doesn't account for every GPO however it's not what I think, it is a fact eh...

[Maverick]

I assume these are men, because women are less likely to have no feelings for live creatures of the deep. I know my girl would kick me in the DING DING if i tried that. so if it comes down to it, don't cut there air lines that coud kill them. Just give them a quick kick in the ding ding and then it will be hard to dawn their suits and the octo will not have a chance to be molested.

lust dive three tree point at night, there are huge GPO's there out in the open at night, pretty cool. I have been with one so big it was twice as long as me, tentacle to tentacle. :occasion5:

[sheahanmcculla]

Squirting soap into an octo's den is accosting it with an irritant that burns them. Burns their gills, burns their flesh, and potentially in the end, kills them. The death may not be immediate, but rather slow and painful. That same soap also kills other creatures sharing the same dens.

How do you know this? I have found nothing on the net about this subject. I think we give too many rights to animals. You guys are all talking about doing something to the diver if he does this. So you would rather see a diver messed up, then a octo (who's life is meaningless compared to humans) get a little uncomfortable. It's pretty sad.

[John Rawlings]

OK....some of the posts here are going a bit over the top.....cutting suits....cutting hoses.....kicking butt.....C'mon! It's time to simmer down.

Let's look at the actual facts:

1) Use of chemicals or irritants to force an octopus out of its den is illegal in this state as per WDFW regulations.
2) A GPO will immediately vacate a den when "irritants" are introduced to the den.
3) Unless the irritant is extremely lethal, the only effect on the octopus is merely to compell it to vacate the den.
4) Octopuses, or any other marine life with gills, will not re-enter a den that has been "tainted" with an irritant until such time as that irritant has dissipated and will no longer irritate their gills. This has the effect of rendering the den at least temporarily unusable, which is a problem in and of itself.

That's it.....nothing more....

We don't NEED to take this to extremes.

Here is ALL any of us really needs to know:

Using a chemical irritant to force an Octopus from its den is a CRIME. It's UNETHICAL. It SHOULDN'T BE DONE any more than any other blatant act of poaching of any species., such as taking fish or game out of season, shooting animals at night, selling bear gall bladders, spearing Yelloweye Rockfish, etc., etc., etc.

This discussion was useful when it dealt with ways of preventing the crime from taking place. Once it devolved into talking about physical assault of the perpetrator and damaging his/her equipment it became (ahem) shall we say, "less than useful"?

The toll-fee Poaching Hotline for Washington State is 1-800-477-6224.

You can also report violators on-line here: http://wdfw.wa.gov/enf/poaching.htm

- John

[Huskychemist]

Squirting soap into an octo's den is accosting it with an irritant that burns them. Burns their gills, burns their flesh, and potentially in the end, kills them. The death may not be immediate, but rather slow and painful. That same soap also kills other creatures sharing the same dens.

How do you know this? I have found nothing on the net about this subject. I think we give too many rights to animals. You guys are all talking about doing something to the diver if he does this. So you would rather see a diver messed up, then a octo (who's life is meaningless compared to humans) get a little uncomfortable. It's pretty sad.

I didn't find anything about soap having a negative impact on an octopus, but I did find a few discussions of soap and fish fills.

"Soap detergents (including the biodegradable detergents) can have a poisonous effect on all types of aquatic life. Detergents can also cause severe damage to the gills, and destroy the external mucus layers that protect fish from bacteria and parasites. Additionally, too much soap in the water can make it difficult for aquatic organisms to get the oxygen from the water they need to survive."

Source: Maryland Department of Natural Resources. (http://www.dnr.state.md.us/Bay/tribstra ... ution.html, accessed March 29th, 2008.)

And in the interest of full disclosure, the website does not cite any sources for this information. I would have felt a lot better about it if they cited a specific article. That said, a google search about "effect of soap on gills" turned up a few references to the negative impact of surfactants on fish gills, such as this one:

"Two types of detergents, one easily oxidized and the other not, damage the chemoreceptors of yellow bullheads, Ictalurus natalis (le Sueur) exposed to concentrations of 0.5 parts per million in the surrounding water. This concentration is considerably lower than that at which sublethal damage has been detected previously. Histological examination reveals erosion of the taste buds; electrophysiological methods and observations of swimming and feeding behavior reveal impairment of receptor function. Affected fish do not fully recover after 6 weeks in detergent-free water."

The above paragraph is the abstract from the following article in Science magazine: Detergents: Effects on the Chemical Senses of the Fish Ictalurus natalis (le Sueur). John E. Bardach, Masaru Fujiya, and Arthur Holl (18 June 1965)
Science 148 (3677), 1605.


My general philosophy: I'm a guest in the underwater world, so I try to minimize my impact.

[diverchick]

So, I am very aware of who these divers are and I was one of the first people to know about this cruel act. I can assure all of you It is going to be taken care of today... I will post the outcome soon. Thanks for everyones concern and interest in the topic.

[Sergeant Pepper]

For the most part, I leave these rather contentious threads behind, but I will offer one piece of sage wisdom regarding this particular post

"It seems that your plea for help/advice indicates a desire to NOT upset these people or lay down the law to them. Sometimes people (even those you care about/respect etc) leave you no choice."

I have found that many times in life, I have had to just leave friends or acquaintances to their own path and not associate with them anymore. I'm sure others have experienced this before, but the real learning experience that forever changed who I associate with was a terrible marriage. I decide rather immediately who to include in my social circle based upon words and action. Many times, I've had friends that weren't bad people, but something made it crystal clear that we just didn't mesh and without warning, resentment or anger, I leave them be... it just makes my existence that much easier.

[diverchick]

I have great news. Hopefully those guys will not harass anymore animals. They have been talked to. All should be well now. Thanks everyone.

[SwimmerTodd]

To my astonishment and great disappointment, it has come to my attention that this thread has been directed toward myself and a good dive buddy. Let me tell you a little story.

A couple of months ago, there was a speaker at our dive club meeting who, by complete accident, said that they were carrying bottles of “bleach, uhhh soap” along with them to hunt octopuses. It was an incredible blunder and since then we have had a running inside joke about bringing the soap when we’re going somewhere with GPO’s. The same was said at the dive shop where diverchick was working on Wednesday afternoon. Her friend CoachRenz is the one that started this thread.

Long story short – had either of two had the courage and decency to simply ask if we were serious, this whole melodrama could have been avoided. We have no intention of using soap to get out a GPO. Period. We have been made the subject of a witch hunt that is completely warrantless and all based on third-hand information.

You all wanted the outcome? Well, here it is. A friendship has been lost. The fish and wildlife guys will be coming to the divesite tomorrow morning only to find that we are doing nothing wrong. There’s your outcome.

You want to know what the outcome was? We were to apologized for a silly little thing getting blown out of proportion. Good job, Diverchick. You've managed to save the helpless GPO's from no danger whatsoever. Was it worth losing some friends?

[sheahanmcculla]

HA! That ending kinda sucked!

[gomi_otaku]

I'd rather see action that results in no wrong found, than wrongdoing with no action from the community. One of the members of our dive club recently showed a video from Maui that had the DM handling an octo to get it to ink. Someone on our forum started up a thread saying that it disturbed him. It seemed like everyone was in consensus there. But yet, nobody had mentioned it to the DM when they got topside. So, who was wrong? Again, even if it was in error, I'd rather have someone called out and then hear their "explanation" than hear about the damage afterward from someone saying "Where the hell did all the octos at Sunrise go?" Or better yet, just don't put yourself in the situation of having to explain.
gomi_

[Sergeant Pepper]

Divers are like a-holes. We all stink and we're always on the bottom.

Sorry, it was the best I could come up with on short notice.

[Sounder]

Let me get this straight...
You're upset because he didn't ask you if you were serious, but instead he asked his peers, without mentioning names, how they would approach it? He specified that he wanted real answers and while many of us got carried away (myself included), I feel like his question was more than appropriate. The query was directed on HOW his peers felt he should APPROACH you.

Bottom line, not everyone around you knew it was a joke... and I bet I'm not the only one who doesn't find it funny. Your comments disturbed people and the idea of the thread was to figure out the most appropriate way to discuss this with you in a constructive way.

Who was this speaker at the dive club meeting? What dive club was this? I'm upset that a dive club would allow someone to come in and "oops" say something illegal and unethical without calling them on it. I know that if someone came into THIS group and accidently mentioned something like that, they'd be called on it.

[sheahanmcculla]

I'm Glad I live in America where we can say what we want!

[coachrenz]

Just to make some things clear...

First, I am responding to the personal attack in a previous post privately, as should be done, rather than taking public shots.

Second, I was not in attendance when the original discussion of this event took place. Had I been, I would have dealt with it then and there.

Third, the context of the guest speaker was that he was telling stories of diving in the 70's, back when I assume that using soap to get octos out of their dens was not illegal or at least not as frowned upon. He was also talking about spearfishing for rockfish in the Puget sound and in the San Juans which was also legal at the time.

Fourth, it is still snowing at my house.

[Joshua Smith]

Firstly, I'm glad to hear no Octos were harmed in the making of this little thread.

Secondly- personal attacks, slander, and hysterics will not be tolerated.

Thirdly- This weather sucks, and I've been working outside most of the winter.

Fourthly- I will now be making myself a nice drink.

[Sounder]

Fourthly- I will now be making myself a nice drink.

Me too?

[Pez7378]

Let's let that be the last word.


(No octo's were hurt in the making of this film)

Funny, Nailer and I had the same thought................