Watch a vampire squid demonstrate its unique defense against outside threats. http://on.natgeo.com/2yn6rGW | National Geographic History

Vampire squid supremacy 🦑⁠ ⁠ It’s easy to imagine the vampire squid as a nightmarish predator. It lurks in the eternal midnight of the deep sea, has a dark red body, huge blue eyes, and a cloak-like web that stretches between its eight arms. When threatened, it turns inside out, exposing rows of wicked-looking “cirri.” Even its scientific name, Vampyroteuthis infernalis, means “vampire squid from hell.”⁠ ⁠ In reality, the vampire squid is a soft-bodied, passive creature, about the size, shape,

The vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis) isn’t a fearsome predator, it drifts in the deep-sea darkness and survives in the ocean’s lowest oxygen zones thanks to its ultra-efficient blue blood and sluggish metabolism. With velvety webbed arms that can invert into a “pumpkin puff,” razor-spine cirri, giant eyes the size of dimes, hundreds of photophores, and a glowing cloud of sticky bioluminescent mucus that can dazzle predators for up to 10 minutes, it’s a deep-sea ghost cloaked in sci-fi e