Aquariums design elaborate escape-proof lids for their octopus tanks, and still they are often thwarted. And he should know: He has worked with them for twenty years and is expert in keeping these intelligent invertebrates occupied. “Octopuses are phenomenally smart,” Menashi says. While no fewer than six people were watching, and three of us had our arms in her tank, Octavia had stolen the bucket right out from under us. We stroked her much as we would a dog, enchanted with the spectacle of her color-changing skin, the sensation of her suckers, the acrobatics of her many arms. But she was so curious and friendly that no one could resist the chance to touch her skin, which was soft as custard. Octavia’s were strong enough to leave hickeys on our arms. A single sucker on a large male can lift thirty pounds, and the animal has 1,600 of them. In movies and stories, octopuses are portrayed as monsters, and the giant Pacific is the largest and strongest of them all. Occasionally Wilson handed her a fish from the plastic bucket perched on the edge of her tank. When we put our hands in the water, her arms rose to meet ours, embracing us with dozens of her strong, sensitive, white suckers. Turning red with excitement, she flowed over toward us from the far side of her tank. When her keeper, Bill Murphy, opened the top of her exhibit, Octavia had recognized Wilson and me immediately we’d been working with her for several weeks. Tamed and Untamed: Close Encounters of the Animal Kind *by Sy Montgomery and Elizabeth Marshall Thomas is available in stores now.

The Octopus Scientists by Sy Montgomery