I share some raw notebook pages from the Okinawa cephalopod conference in this month's OctoPost! (I'd hoped to post more during the conference itself, but the international travel kinda wrecked me and I'm still recovering.) 🦑🐙 buttondown.com/dannastaaf/a...

I discovered these layers in an old art file. Dear past me, I think you need to lie down and perhaps take an ibuprofen

Fact!

Today's #Paleoctober prompt was my baby Plectronoceras, so I had to add it to the #inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober mashup. They all played nicely: the gravity of the black hole makes things ragged, and Plectro is already my non-human OC.

The Worm represents flexibility, adaptability, surprise, determination. Reversed: hunger, greed, traps, unchecked growth. (A sand striker can grow almost 10ft. The spacecraft entering its jaws represents its broad diet and large appetite.) #inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober

What is going on here on day 13 of #inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober? My daughter took one look and said "Oh, it's drinking blood." 😬 The banded sugar ant is quite capable of killing other ants with formic acid, but idk, this one looks kind of sad...

Today in cutest thing ever -- did you know that the star Betelgeuse has a *companion star* and it's called Betelbuddy?! BETELBUDDY!! ✨ earthsky.org/space/new-de...

I love this book. I want to live in it. The characters are a delight, the plot is gripping, and most of all the biological worldbuilding blew me away. Giant toads with hot springs inside their mouths! Migratory mountain ranges! Actual sundogs!

I think we can safely assume this razor clam is shredded from all that exercise shredding (and playing saxophone). Day 12 #inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober catchup

Catching up with day 11 of #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober . . . In which asteroid witches threaten to throw live spider into cauldron, unaware they are falling victim to sting operation! (Look, sometimes the prompts don't fit together all that well 😆)

Today's #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober mashup is a patch!

Today in #CephalopodAwarenessDays: #Squittleday! Today honors squid & cuttlefish. This should be done every day imo, I'll take what I can get.. FUN FACT: Cuttlefish have been my favorite creature since I was 5. I fell for them HARD. Here is Ze Frank with TRUE FACTS: www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDwO...

Flamboyant cuttlefish are heavier (less buoyant) than other cuttles, which is why they "walk" on the sea floor most of the time instead of swimming. This poor little pal can't float up to visit the nebula! 🥺 #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober

Whale Fall pin 🦀🐋🦑

Yesterday's #inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge #OC_tober mashup!

It's #WorldOctopusDay! While I already have a post for #OCTOtober, here's a bonus of some octopus shitposts from personal collection

Happy #WorldOctopusDay! My newsletter today has a guide for teaching tricks to your pet octopus 🐙🦑 or maybe it's research about octopus arm flexibility in the wild, read it and find out! buttondown.com/dannastaaf/a...

THANK YOU 🤣 this is the balm my soul needs after witnessing the horrors of those "octopus skeletons" in Halloween stores...

#WorldOctopusDay 2025- Takotsubo and #Optic Glands: The Poetic Deaths of #Octopuses with our flagship journal ICB author Z.Yan Wang blog by Colleen Heck learn more about the extraordinary circumstances of this species death integrativeandcomparativebiology.wordpress.com/2025/10/08/w... #science

I love cooloola monsters but let’s be honest this is an antipodean stenopelmatid. Ninos de la Terra Nullius en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ammopel...

Per my daughter's request, the #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge mashup now includes #OC_tober 😁 I'm actually ridiculously proud of this one 🌊🧑‍🚀

it's baby 🥹

A quick doodle mashup today for #Inktober #Invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge

This is most definitely *not* the lesser of any two weevils

Sometimes the prompts are unexpectedly compatible. I'd never realized before that lobsters, spacecraft, and deer ALL have antennae! #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge

Sure we've all seen the man, and the rabbit...but have you ever seen the palmetto weevil in the moon? It's kind of murky 😆 #invertober2025 #inktober #SpacetoberChallenge

Catch-up day 3 of #Inktober #invertober2025 #SpacetoberChallenge

good news, if you're stuck on the prompts you can just add another one! #Inktober #Invertober #SpacetoberChallenge

I just couldn't stop thinking about how weird sperm whale mouths are and yet how perfectly shaped for inserting giant squid into

So keen to read THE RADIANT SEA by @stevehaddock.bsky.social & Sönke Johnsen! In the introduction, @helenscales.bsky.social says it's like having the authors "looking over your shoulder and telling stories," an experience I've been lucky enough to get with Steve. Also, COVER CEPHALOPOD 🐙🦑🌊

It's a mustache medusa! I'm mashing up the #inktober and #invertober prompts this year 😁 #invertober2025

My least favorite part of freelance life has been a) learning about indemnity clauses, b) pushing back against them, and c) hearing "no one else has a problem with it" 😩 Very soothing to spend an hour with folks in the same boat. Thanks to speaker Dawn Fallik and organizer @ellenkuwana.bsky.social!

SO excited for this! My daughter asked me to do Inktober with her this year, so I decided I'll combine the two prompt lists. 😁

Tomorrow I get to give a brand-new talk about my favorite things: cephalopod sex and babies! Come giggle with me about explosive spermatophores and sniffle with me about octopus moms 🐙🦑🧪 Tuesday Sept 30 at 3:45pm PT / ​6:45pm ET on zoom Tickets here: smithsonianassociates.org/ticketing/pr...

I am the gar I long and thin I have a jaw things fit within Yet sometimes shapes are wrong for head so do my best & lik the bread

🎉 Happy birthday, Jeanne Villepreux-Power! 🎉 I wrote a biography, THE LADY AND THE OCTOPUS, about this inventor of aquariums, sleuth of octopus mysteries, first woman in many scientific societies and consummate polyglot. lernerbooks.com/shop/show/21...

Squid scientists Clyde Roper & Liz Shea calculated this! bioone.org/journals/Ame... I summarized their results in Monarchs of the Sea, which led a lovely reader to discover a slight error (deets in 🧵), which I shared with Liz, which reduces it to "only" ~2 million giant squid. Eaten. Every. Day.

a) Rebecca's thread is A++ b) yeah ok I'm a squid gal but can we talk whale size... this is a whale for whom a GIANT SQUID is a LITERAL MOUTHFUL c) the footage is rare & exciting for us, but it's just tuesday snacktime for sperm whales. this mama could eat 7-8 giant squid PER DAY 🧪🦑🌊

I made a new "finding thousands in cephalopod facts" comic to celebrate reaching 1K followers on instagram! 🧪🦑🐡 Please note these are all informed estimates/approximations. 😁References in thread

@biographic.bsky.social publishes so much of my favorite nature writing, from the epic story behind sea star wasting disease by @craigwelch.bsky.social to creepy, beautiful bites like "Mom on the Menu" by @cestmoilanglois.bsky.social I'm grateful that I'm able to donate!

btw the origin story of this art was brainstorming with my spouse how to include cephalopods me: Holding a teacup that contains a tiny octopus? spouse: Angel and devil cephalopods on your shoulders? me: Octopus arms instead of lips? spouse: NO. Absolutely not. Do not draw that one. me: 🥹👉👈

this is like 80% of my gardening strategy tbh. another 10% is "plant natives" and the final 10% is "let my kids do any necessary pruning to give them an acceptable outlet for violence"

Thanks to @franzanth.bsky.social for suggesting "cursed" when I was stuck on how to color the circumoral appendages! 😄 Planning to use this as a new author avatar (yes I cut my hair short)

Can you identify this animal? 🔍️👀 Did you get a kick out of shouting “acorn worm” at your phone? If so, you might enjoy playing @fathomverse.bsky.social. This month, you can find acorn worms by playing FathomVerse and earn a special badge! Learn more about acorn worms: www.mbari.org/animal/acorn...

Ok I'm trying to decide on a color for the arms. A nice subtle brownish or reddish hue? Something striking like blue or purple?

please I can't handle the two balloon dogs my son made for me

Happy Cephalopod Week! My latest OctoPost (all the news that's fit to ink!) dives into a new technique for finding very very old squid, with a shoutout to @scifri.bsky.social and . . . plant-based hyper-realistic fake octopus? Check it out! 🐙🦑🧪 buttondown.com/dannastaaf/a...

This #CephalopodWeek, dive in and join our Sea of Support! You can pick your favorite cephalopod, add your name, and help fuel cool projects like this one.

Did you know octopuses don’t have tentacles? They have arms with suckers that can “taste” harmful microbes on the surfaces they touch.

Yo, writers! Come write some bug stuff!