Specimen image via iDigBio · CC0
Species
Least Concerncommon paper nautilus
SPECIES
- KingdomAnimalia
- PhylumMollusca
- ClassCephalopoda
- OrderOctopoda
- FamilyArgonautidae
via GBIF · IUCN
Museum specimens
- Specimen records
- 565
- With media
- 114
- Family
- Argonautidae
- Collections
- PRI, SIO, UCMP, UM-RSMAS, USNM, TCWC
- Recorded in
- United States, South Africa, Mexico, Philippines
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Argonauta argo, also known as the greater argonaut, is a species of pelagic octopus belonging to the genus Argonauta. In some parts of Guangdong, China, this species is locally known as “白海马巢” While the name literally translates as "white sea-horse's nest", the term "sea-horse" in regional Sinitic languages actually refers to sand crabs (such as ghost crabs) rather than the animal commonly known as a seahorse, and bears no relation to horses. In Taizhou, local elderly speakers refer to its shell as "sea-horse shell", while the soft body is called "octopus".
A. argo was the first argonaut species to be described and is consequently the type species of the genus. The type specimen of A. argo was collected in the Mediterranean Sea and is deposited at the Linnean Society of London.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Argonauta argo” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.