Danna Staaf

Paleontologists don't really need to come up with crazy ideas, at least when it comes to cephalopods. Evolution's got that departement completely covered- as we can see from the evolutionary arms race that happened over the course of the Mesozoic.
Three groups of predatory marine reptiles would seem to be more for anybody to contend with. But marine reptiles weren't the only shell breakers, and cephalopods weren't the only victims. The perpetrators of the Mesozoic's widespread shell predation were fish and shark, crabs and lobsters, and even snails, taking no pity on their kin. They crunched, cracked, drilled and pried their way into virtually every mollusk shell in the sea. The evolutionary results are recorded in rock, as natural selection drove ongoing advances in armor.

However, despite shell similarities with early fossils, today's nautiluses have evolved their own contemporary peculiarities. Their heads bear not eight, not ten, but anywhere between sixty and ninety tentacles. The number can vary even within a single species. To add to the confusion, nautilus tentacles are not elastic and have no suckers. Instead, each tentacle consists of a protective sheath and a long thin sticky part that can be extended or withdrawn. What's more, at some point in the nautilus's evolution the two uppermost tentacles seem to have enlarged and fuset to form a protective hood aver the animal. It's enough to make you throw up your hads and study snails instead, with one simple foot each.

Long before humanity was even a twinkle in the eye of the first mammal, our planet was rule by strange and fearsome creatures. Some grew to monstruous size, the largest animals the earth had ever seen. During their 400 millions years of glory they diversified to fill every niche, from voracious predators to placid grazer - and then a global cataclysm almost completely wiped them out. Only a humble few of their descendants survive to keep us company today.
Of course, I'm talking about cephalopods.