Body Patterns of the Frilled Giant Pacific Octopus, a New Species of Octopus from Prince William Sound, AK

Abstract: We tested whether body patterns distinguished two haplotypes of large octopus in Prince William Sound Alaska. Live octopuses were photographed in captivity and assigned to a morphotype based on whether longitudinal mantle folds (a characteristic body pattern feature of the giant Pacific octopus (GPO), Enteroctopus dofleini (Wulker 1910)) were present (the GPO morphotype, N = 14) or absent (a novel morphotype, N = 6). Novel morphotype octopuses were distinguished without exception from GPO morphotype octopuses by the presence of a lateral mantle frill and the absence of longitudinal mantle folds, ventral mantle texture below the lateral frill, and patch and groove patterning. Additional traits could be used in combination to reliably characterize the novel morphotype. The genetic haplotypes of these octopuses were determined from nucleotide sequence data from two microsatellite loci and a portion of the OCDE gene. The GPO morphotype was identified with E. dofleini based on the match of body patte...