The Masterminds Living in Our Oceans (Full Episode) _ Secrets of the Octopus _ Nat Geo Animals

Beneath the waves lives a mysterious creature older than the dinosaurs. Octopus. So incredibly alien, changing color in an instant. Shapeshifting almost anything. Masters of disguise. Now we're discovering they are one of the most intelligent beings on the planet. Two years immersed in their world reveals they use tools. I felt completely shocked at the level of sophistication that I was witnessing. Think creatively, communicate with other species, and maybe even dream. I wonder sometimes if the octopuses are dreaming about me, wondering what I am, who I am. We're just beginning to understand what they have to tell us. I have just had a conversation with an octopus. The island of Sulawesi. 3,000 miles. A lush, densely forested coastline. But beneath the water, things look very different. A few scattered reefs are the only refuge in an underwater desert. Any animal going out in the open is vulnerable. To survive here, you need brawn. Or brains. This is a coconut octopus. At 18 months old, she's already halfway through her short life. Like all octopuses, her mother died after she was born. She's been alone her whole life. Every single thing she's learned about the world. She's taught herself. And with astonishing speed. Most importantly, how to hunt. As she crushes her crab with her powerful bird-like beak, the succulent scent of her meal attracts attention. She could lose her dinner. Or her life. There's nowhere to hide. But even in her short life, she's learned how to make a run. Clasping the crab in two arms, she uses the others like feet. It's called stilt walking. But she can't run forever. It's time to take cover. And she's not called a coconut octopus for nothing. She uses her propulsive siphon, like a leaf blower, to blast away sand clogging the shell. Using an object to solve a problem is known by scientists as tool use. A sign of great intelligence. Just 0.1% of animals are thought to use tools. Making a hideout earns her a place in this exclusive club. Scientists believe we've barely scratched the surface of octopus smarts. National Geographic explorer and animal psychologist Dr. Alex Schnell researches octopus intelligence in the wild. I really want to understand what's going on inside the octopus mind. But we're only just discovering how they're using that brain power. Alex suspects these octopuses are capable of even more advanced tool use. Local expert Benhur Sarinda is here to help her research. Let's give it a go. Let's try it. If their tool use has a type of ability that we call future planning. This is the ability to carry tools for future use and it's a hallmark of intelligence. We've only ever seen it in chimpanzees and crows and humans. A coconut octopus, but that's no coconut. This small female is using a clamshell because it has a big advantage. Portability. Even when you've got eight arms, two shells are a handful. But so worth it. A large shoal of hungry mullet is a frightening sight for a fist-sized octopus. Her clamshells are the perfect safe house. Different type of shell, same genius tool use. And to Alex's amazement, she's not done yet. When she finds the right spot, she starts work on a more permanent shelter. This octopus has a remarkable understanding of how these shapes fit together. She manipulates the shells to fit just so. It's what Alex has been hoping to see. Right in front of our eyes, she solves the problem of being so exposed in this desert-like landscape, bringing along her own shelter to use the next time that she might venture out. With no parental training and short lifespans, octopuses learn fast. Within months, they have to master problem solving and possibly plan for the future. Octopuses don't just make simple plans. They can devise complex and cunning strategies. When the tide turns here on this volcanic archipelago, the retreating Atlantic leaves behind tidal pools, and the churning water brings with it a visitor from the deep. It's a hungry island octopus. Six months old, his hunting skills are all self-taught. He's about to take the ultimate risk. Sally Lightfoot crabs, octopus favorite. The turning tides now exposes one of their favorite things to eat. Fresh algae. Mmm, so mouthwatering. But to get to it takes a leap of faith. The young octopus won't get as much as a snack by staying where he is. He needs a plan. Muscles in his eyes change the shape of the lens so he can focus out of water and see the best way to the jumping crabs. It's a dangerous journey. Sure, he's smart. But is he willing to bet his life on a strategy? He's going for it. He'll dry out and die in 20 minutes. One wrong move and he's truly cooked. He makes it. It's time for the next step of his master plan. Positioning rocks to make the perfect cover. The trap is set. The island octopus has thought up, tested, and executed a killer hunting technique. Six months old, entirely self-taught. An accomplished strategist. So how do octopuses come up with all these smart ideas despite living such short lives? To understand that, you need to know them as individuals. Extreme diver Crystal Janicki has logged more than 600 hours in the freezing waters off Canada's southern Pacific coast. It's a strange and otherworldly place to explore. The cold water is rich in oxygen and nutrients. Turbocharging life and pushing it to extremes. Lurking in the deep is a colossus. The giant Pacific octopus is the biggest octopus on the planet. From arm tip to arm tip of a school bus. By diving with these giants for so many years, Crystal has begun to recognize and build relationships with individual octopuses. When you lock eyes with an octopus, it's such a special moment. I get a real sense that they want to connect with us. They want to learn from us. They have such curious minds. Maybe they're not so different from us after all. Crystal is a citizen scientist. And her face time with octopuses has led to a realization. Every animal has a distinct personality. While they're all smart, each uses its brain power in different ways. The best way to see it is to follow one. To reach her full size, this giant Pacific octopus needs to eat at least six meals a day. It's amazing to think that she started out as a hatchling the size of a grain of rice. These octopuses have one of the fastest growth rates of any animal. Her favorite food, red rock crab, is no easy catch. They're agile and fast. But they're up against a mastermind. Octopuses are hardwired for learning. They have such incredible brains, such incredible knowledge. And the way they learn and grow so fast blows my mind. When it comes to building neurons, critical brain connections for intelligence, octopuses have three times more capacity than humans. They're perfectly primed for new information. Every hunt is a chance to learn. Over time, I started to notice how quickly they can problem solve and adapt on the fly. Using her taste sensitive suckers, she feels for crabs hidden in the rocks. No luck with that strategy. But a genius can change tack fast. She flushes the crabs out into open terrain. Then all of a sudden, she's gone. She disappears within seconds. And then I see her tucked into the rocks. I'm not sure if she's searching for something or if she's hiding. Her plan becomes clear. An ambush. She releases toxins that liquefy the crabs insides, making crab soup. Her tactic is creative, clever. But more importantly, it's hers. No family to nurture or guide them. They seem to spend their short lives working out how they want to do something. The more they experience, the more they learn. And all beyond that speed. One of the biggest questions is just how octopuses retain all this information. Tucked safely in her den, this island octopus is sleeping. She's earned it. She spends her days hunting in a complex world full of obstacles and enemies. To help navigate it, scientists believe that octopuses have an especially sharp memory for geography. They might be able to build a mental map of visual landmarks. And remember what they touch and taste. Like a multi-sensory GPS, this built-in road map points them to food. It's also a lifesaver. Barracuda are dangerous. Like most octopuses, she fires ink to create a distraction. But it's her memory that provides an escape route. A direct path back to her den. She might sleep for four hours. But her mind may not be entirely offline. It could be downloading. Dr. C.E. O'Brien is fascinated by the secrets of octopus sleep. In particular, the role sleep plays in octopus learning. Over the course of 24 hours, the octopus spends about 60% of the time actually sleeping. I was very excited when I first saw the octopus sleeping because it is a behavior that had only been observed in the lab before. To document her sleep, Dr. O'Brien places a small camera at the mouth of her den. I can tell she's asleep by the dilation of her pupils. Becomes a very narrow slit. So for about 40 minutes, she'll be a very pale color, very quiet, very little movement. You'll just see her breathing. Then after about 40 minutes, she'll show something like REM sleep. So very suddenly, there'll be changes in color. You'll see movement of her mantle, her arms, her suckers. It really seems like when she's in that active sleep that she is experiencing dreams. It reminds me of a dog when it's sleeping and it's moving its paws and its whiskers, probably dreaming of chasing a squirrel or a rabbit. This similarity to a dog may be no coincidence. In mammals and birds, sleep plays an important role in memory consolidation and learning. So it's very likely that octopuses sleep for the same reasons. So it's possible that she's consolidating the memories of the new path that she took while she was foraging. Remembering where a particular tasty crab was or maybe a particularly nasty eel was. I wonder sometimes if the octopuses are dreaming about me. Maybe she's dreaming about my face sticking in her den. Wondering what I am, who I am, why I'm there. If octopuses really do dream, it could explain how they're able to retain so much knowledge in such short lives. But what if everything they know about the world isn't just remembered, but used as the raw material for brand new ideas? Dr. Alex Schnell and Benher Sirinda have returned to the den of the coconut octopus. The octopus has already shown Alex tool use, using a shell to hide from predators. But Alex hopes that if she's patient, she may get to see something even more astonishing. Creativity. When we're looking for glimmers of intelligence, we traditionally focus on animals that are more closely related to us. But to find it in an octopus that's so distantly related from humans, that would completely reframe the way we think about intelligence in the animal kingdom. Her clamshell hideout is safely tucked into the sand. It's the perfect location, but you can't always pick your neighbors. A mantis shrimp has moved in next door. The octopus would gladly eat her tiny, but this standoff isn't as one-sided as it looks. The shrimp may be small, but he's highly aggressive, highly territorial. See that leg with a white club-like tip folded down in front? That's a defiant fighting pose known as the merrill spread. See that punch? Well, you can't. Because it's as fast as a bullet. And 50 times faster than the blink of an eye. A mantis shrimp's high-powered punch can kill animals much larger than themselves. It's brains versus prawn. Time to see what being one of the fastest learners on the planet gets you when your back's against the wall. The octopus blasts the shrimp with water. But this tiny terror is just too fast. And his punch too painful. Then, Alex witnesses something extraordinary. The octopus has an idea. She picks up the building blocks of her house and repurposes them. She's imagined herself a shield. I just couldn't believe what I was seeing. I was screaming underwater. Coming out of her den and grabbing that shell to use it as a shield, it was such a beautiful example of really complex intelligence. Taking a familiar object and reimagining it? That's behavior never filmed before. I felt completely shocked down there today at the level of sophistication that I was witnessing. It reshapes the way we think about the octopus mind and just what they're capable of. Scientists often look for answers in animals more closely related to us, like chimpanzees, elephants and whales. But to get a bigger picture of how intelligence evolved, we need to look at diverse species. And the octopus is key. Octopuses may have no parents to guide them and live such short lives. But from the moment they're born, they use their minds, memory and remarkable ability to innovate. Not just to survive, but to thrive in their underwater world.