My take on octopuses is this: why are we so caught up with discovering life on other planets when we have these alien life forms right here on our home planet?

Well, when it comes to octopus adventures, Sy Montgomery has seen it all and proves my opinion correct. She joins us today on Modern Notion Daily to talk about her new book, The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Explanation into the Wonder of Consciousness (Atria Books, May 2015). Montgomery talks about the proper plural of “octopus” (hint: it’s not “octopi”) and then gets into tales of the strange animal: how they get trapped in locked boxes, how they escape from their tanks at aquaria all over the world, how they turn white when relaxed—you name it, the octopus does it. Montgomery, all the while, just adores them. And we think you will adore Sy Montgomery. And just to give you hint of what you’re in for. Here are some of the coolest facts I learned from The Soul of an Octopus. 

1. A giant Pacific octopus can weigh “as much as a man and stretch as long as a car, yet can pour its baggy, boneless body through an opening the size of an orange.” This makes them great escape artists—just ask anyone at an aquarium who’s had to go searching for a renegade octopus.

2. They change color to blend in with their surroundings. But a red octopus usually means it’s excited (good or bad), and white means it’s calm. Female octopuses turn white around each other because they are “someone who they need not fight or flee.” Girl power.

3. One male giant Pacific octopus sucker—and they have 1,600 of them—can lift 30 pounds. So don’t let one of those things get near your eye balls.

4. The giant Pacific octopus hatches from an egg the size of a grain of rice and can ultimately weigh as much as a man.

5. An octopus’s sex organs are on its third right leg.

6. They love to open jars and solve puzzles.

7. In addition to feeling, an octopus’s suckers can taste.

8. Octopuses can tell individual humans apart. So if you upset an octopus, you may wind up soaked in salt water.