The Great King Squid, scientific name Architeuthis dux, is more widely known as the Great King Squid. In fact, this animal belongs to the pipe squid, and the relationship with the squid is not very close, more correct Chinese name should be called the king squid. The real squid is very small, there are no giant species. In literature, film and television, the great king squid is a monster that claims to be up to 18 meters tall and weighs a ton, and can compete with sperm whales. Today, Zoology uses scientific data to tell everyone how big it is, and can it really compete with sperm whales?
<h1>The legend of the North Sea Demon</h1>
Over the past few hundred years, the fog has haunted the king squid, and the legends of various monsters have endured for a long time for sailors, explorers and curiosity enthusiasts. In 16th-century natural history books, it was thought to be a possible prototype for monster figures such as the "Sea Monk", "Polish Bishop" or "Sea Bishop". Of course, the most famous legend is the "North Sea Demon". In Norse legend, the North Sea Demon lives in the oceans near Northern Europe and Greenland, usually lurking on the bottom of the sea, floating on the surface when there is a catastrophe, and is abstracted by people as a "twisted, entangled" creature. Its size is huge, and when it floats on the sea, its huge body will be mistaken for an island by some sailors, and some people will even climb this "island". The real horror of this monster is not in itself, but in the huge whirlpool it brings with it when it sinks rapidly, which will sink ships and sailors into the ocean. Alfred the Great of England once said that the Nordic giant demon had been sleeping on the unfathomable seabed for centuries, and the day it rose from the bottom of the sea with a roar was the end of the world.
The image of the North Sea Demon
In 1555, Magnus pointed out in his book that the legendary North Sea Demon was such a giant squid. Many of the early rumors of sea monsters may have been derived from one or two giant squid samples found off the coasts of Norway and Denmark between 1550 and 1554, and the carcasses of king squid were found in Newfoundland, Canada, in the northwest Atlantic as early as the 16th century by basque and Portuguese fishermen who had arrived in North America by sea. Although in the 16th century humans had access to some large king squid samples, in an era without systematic museums, collection and long-term preservation were unrealistic. In the last century, the specimens of the great king squid have been collected around the world and studied and published by experts, and its mysterious veil has gradually been unveiled. Today, Zoology talks about the true size of the king squid by modern standards.
An old photograph taken in Newfoundland in 1873 is probably the most widely circulated photograph of the great squid
The great king squid has been considered by some people to have a total length of 30.5-46 meters or even more than 75 meters, which is of course nonsense and not the most confusing data. What is really deceptive is several reports of 16.8-18.3 meters in the 1880s, when multiple authors described or quoted these data, so much so that the size of the king squid was exaggerated for a century. Until the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, when scholars had hundreds of samples taken from all over the world (from stranded, floating, catching, and their natural enemies such as sperm whales and sleeping sharks), they were finally able to systematically and scientifically sort out the size of the giant squid and remove the layers of fog that covered the truth.
In the past, the king squid was also thought to be the overlord of the deep sea that could fight the largest toothed whale, the sperm whale, but the truth and fantasy were always far from each other
<h1>Measurement standards for the great king squid</h1>
Unlike many animals, the most meaningful and stable measure of cephalopods, including the great king squid, is the carcass length (mantle length), in contrast, due to the super stretchability of the two tentacles, the total length of the body is the most unreliable trait, as mentioned in several 18-meter reports in the 1880s mentioned above is that the tentacle was artificially greatly elongated. As for the standard length, it is carcass length + head + brachiopod, which is much more stable than the full length of the body. The animal kingdom is similar to the 18-meter king squid, with a 3.7-4 meter tiger and a 10.5-meter reticulated python, which are elongated skins measured after the animal's death.
The drawing of the great king squid, the carcass mantle, the head of the head, the brachiopod arms, the tentacle tentacles and the tentacle spike tentacle club are clearly visible, the carcass length is the carcass section, the standard length is the carcass to the longest brachiopod end, and the total length of the body is measured to the tentacle spike.
<h1>King squid body size around the world</h1>
New Zealand cephalopod expert O'Shea examined more than 130 samples of king squid, which rarely exceeded 5 meters in length, none of which exceeded 2.25 meters (2.3 meters in one) or had a total body length of more than 12.8 meters, and in another study he noted that the upper weight limit of the king squid was 275 kilograms. While the keratinous beak of the great king squid collected from the stomach of the sperm whale is smaller than the sample captured by the New Zealand trawling, he believes that there is no evidence that the great king squid can grow larger, and the continuation of the myth of the "great king squid 18 meters and 1 ton" is obviously harmful to science.
Turning our attention to southern Africa, marine biologist Hoewen et al. examined some of the great king squid from South African waters, with carcass lengths of 0.4-1.85 meters, adult females averaging 1.69 meters, adult males averaging 1.19 meters, and the heaviest individuals exceeding 183 kilograms.
What about the Pacific Northwest? Japanese giant squid expert Tsuneyoshi Waji measured 57 large king squid found in Japanese waters, with a carcass length of 0.84-1.96 meters and a weight of 25.2-200 kilograms.
This is the carcass length distribution map of the Japanese king squid, the horizontal axis is the carcass length (unit centimeters), the vertical axis is the number, the pink indicates the female, the blue is the male, and the gray represents the gender uncertainty
Speaking of Japan, it is necessary to mention this large king squid that swam to Toyama Bay in Japan, but fortunately it returned safely to the deep water afterwards
Large king squid photographed in Toyama Bay, Japan
Then there is the Kergarang Islands in the southern Indian Ocean, where Cherell, a marine biologist from France, dissected 36 captured Antarctic sleeping sharks and found 7 of them with beaks containing king squid in their stomachs, measuring these beaks and estimating the carcass length of their owners, resulting in an average carcass length of 1.1 meters. It is worth mentioning that the largest carcass in the belly of the shark is 2.2 meters long, which is also a very large individual in the world. It can be seen that even the largest king squid cannot escape the fate of becoming a sleeping shark.
Antarctic sleeping shark, a predatory shark up to 6 meters in size, is a natural predator of cephalopods such as the Great King Squid, and the picture below shows an Antarctic sleeping shark caught in the Falkland Islands.
Then came the Northwest Atlantic, where giant squid expert Aldridge measured individuals in Newfoundland waters, with carcasses measuring 1.07–1.85 m long and the heaviest 181 kg.
So is it true that the carcass length of the great king squid cannot exceed 2.3 meters? No, the largest and most reliable recorded length of the king squid carcass to date is 2.4 meters, in Tasmania, Australia, reported by cephalopod expert Landman and others.
In terms of total body length, King Squid expert Roper has studied more than 100 samples in laboratories and museums around the world for 40 years and found that most of them are between 7.5-10 meters in length, and the largest one is 14.34 meters, from the Bahamas.
The picture shows the corpse of Robb and a large king squid
Considering that the carcass length is more stable and reliable than the full length, and will not be easily elongated, Zoology believes that the largest reliable individual of the great king squid should be an adult female from Tasmania with a carcass length of 2.4 meters, referring to the 2.25-2.3 meters long of the great king squid, which is close to 13 meters in total length, and its total length may exceed 13.6 meters.
With a body length of 13-14 meters, it is undoubtedly the behemoth of the cephalopod family, but it is still not the largest cephalopod. In addition, cephalopods are known as "ocean fries" because of their weak combat effectiveness, and even the great king squid cannot escape the predation of some stronger predators, and in the future, the zoology will introduce other large cephalopods and the feuds between the great king squid and other predators.