The Monterey Bay Aquarium and Research Institute has captured absolutely beautiful underwater footage of a graceful histioteuthis heteropsis gliding through the deep sea. This cephalopod is also known as the “strawberry squid” or “cock-eyed squid” due to its unique coloring and an amazing set of mismatched eyes that allows the squid to spot prey more easily.
Histioteuthis heteropsis, the strawberry squid, gets its common name from the berry-like appearance of its bright-red body speckled with numerous luminescent photophores. This animal is also called the cockeyed squid due to a remarkable eye dimorphism. The left eye of the adult squid can measure more than twice the diameter of the right eye, a curious trait not known in any other family of bilaterally symmetrical animal.
