one its much bigger a twospot octopus tank at the marine biological laboratory has a brick on top so its occupant cant get outthe other problem is that the moms die one twospot octopus at the lab was active and curious shooting a jet of water at visitors a neighboring tank held a dying female hunched over her clusters of transparent eggs the mother was unmoving one eye visiblethe rapid decline of mother octopuses fascinates z yan wang an evolutionary neuroscientist at the university of washington seattle this animal that has such a complex nervous system lives such a short amount of time dr wang saidin a 2018 study she documented how female twospot octopuses first stopped eating while they tended their eggs stroking them and blowing water across them then the mothers turned pale and began acting strangely sometimes eating their own arm tips or wounding themselves with their suckers before dyingdr wang hopes to learn more about this process when she launches her own lab this fall she plans to acquire lesser pacific striped octopuses from the colony started by mr grasse and company and start her own colony using their methods in the animals brains she may find the key that lets them survive reproductionshe has been meeting with a group of other cephalopod researchers including the cape cod team to talk about how to move forward with using the lesser pacific striped octopus in research were all very invested in this species dr wang saiddr caldwell who wasnt able to breed octopus chierchiae beyond two generations has also been a part of these conversations he said the results at the facility in woods hole keeping the animals alive for three generations show promisefrom the seven wild octopus chierchiae mr grasse and his colleagues have raised over 700 children grandchildren and greatgrandchildren in the last generation though they let the colony peter outit was 2020 and because of covid restrictions only one person could be in the facility at a time the scientists had to put the brakes on breeding the octopuses to make sure they didnt make more animals than they could care for only one colony member a geriatric female over 2 years old is still aliveadditionally the colony was showing signs of inbreeding trouble fewer hatchlings were living to adulthood one baby hatched with 16 armsthis winter though five new lesser pacific striped octopuses arrived at the facility from nicaragua the scientists will use what theyve learned to start a new colony this time they hope to keep the gene pool healthy by periodically adding new wild animalswith their welfare in mind mr grasse is providing shells artificial plants and other objects to enrich all the cephalopods artificial homes he also makes sure the animals have variety in their diets changes of scenery and now and then a fun project such as a shrimp in a jar these enrichments help their mental health he saidletting species perform their natural behaviors whether that means hunting