The hardest thing about working with octopuses is their moods. They can be bold and aggressive one day and then refuse to leave their den the next.
They can change the colour and texture of their skin, disguise themselves, use tools and squeeze into tiny spaces. The Oscar-winning documentary My Octopus Teacher is about the relationship between a film-maker and an animal.
We are convinced that high-welfare octopus farming is impossible
While the common octopus may have found its way into people's hearts, it is also at the center of plans by a Spanish fishing company to open the world's first commercial farm in the Canary Islands.
The number of octopuses caught in the wild doubled between 1980 and 2014; however, commercial farming has proved elusive. From Spain and Mexico to Japan and Hawaii, companies and scientists have been working for decades to solve the many challenges it poses, including keeping hatchlings alive, calculating tank conditions and developing the right feed. An animal that grows quickly, reproduces easily and commands a high price is the prize.
Nueva Pescanova appears to be on the verge of winning this race with a facility that it claims will eventually produce 3,000 tons of meat a year. The company believes that the farm will relieve pressure on wild populations by fulfilling the growing demand for octopus meat.
More than 350,000 tons of octopus are caught each year in countries including China, Japan and Mexico, and wild populations are believed to be rapidly declining. Nueva Pescanova said that farming octopuses is necessary to protect a species of great environmental and human value.
Critics say that cultivating these complex creatures would cause great suffering and duplicate the harms of land-based factory farming. Last year, the UK recognised the octopuses as sentient beings.
When kept in close proximity to others, the octopuses can become aggressive. The renowned escape artists who are kept in tanks have been known to eat their own arms, according to Dr. Becca Franks, an environmental studies research scientist at New York University.
They need stimulation if they are kept in a barren plastic tank.
More than 300 scientific studies on sentience in invertebrates were reviewed by a team of scientists. It found very strong evidence of sentience in octopuses and that they can feel pain and distress.
While cows, pigs and other animals are sentient, there is more to know about their welfare needs. She said that it is hard to develop a behavioural proxy for measuring the welfare of the octopus because of the significant shifts in their behavior.
There is no reliable humane slaughter method that could be performed on a large scale. A variety of methods are used to kill animals in the wild, including clubbing, slicing their brains and asphyxiation in a net.
The facility would be at the forefront of best practices in animal welfare and environmental sustainable, but would not specify how big the tanks would be or how densely the octopuses would be kept.
Carlos Rosas is a Biologist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and he believes welfare concerns are a problem.
He said that they were trying to offer the animals the best environment because they were looking for growth. At his small-scale demonstration farm in Yucat, Rosas uses artificial grasses, rocks and tubes in tanks to mimic more natural conditions. He said that his octopuses never escaped.
It's not clear if these conditions would be replicated at the industrial scale proposed by Nueva Pescanova. In Mexico, he believes that seafood can offer economic opportunities for poor people who are living on the coast.
There are claims that farming can prevent overfishing. A study concluded that the harms of wild fishing may lead to a greater demand for seafood.
The best way to relieve pressure on wild stocks is to increase prices and view the meat as a delicacy.
The industry has to justify farming fish because it makes no sense.
Spanish fishing boats land a small amount of fish.
Dozens of animal rights activists gathered in the Canary Islands to protest against the new farm.
"You have this species that has actually been thanked at the Baftas, and then you have this push, I mean really big push, to farm this animal."
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