Beachgoer picks up shell — and finds a tentacled surprise, South Carolina photos show
A woman was taking her regular walk on the beach when she got a tentacled surprise in South Carolina.
Lori McGee said she picked up a whelk shell, checking to see if there was a crab inside. But instead, it was an octopus — and it started crawling toward her, she posted last week on Instagram.
Luckily, McGee said she caught the moment on camera before bringing the octopus back into the water off Isle of Palms, a coastal town roughly 20 miles outside Charleston.
“She wasn’t interested in the whelk anymore, so she set off on another adventure,” she wrote.
Photos McGee posted on social media show coiled tentacles peeking out of a whelk shell that’s about the size of a hand.
“I had a once in a lifetime experience,” the beachgoer wrote last week. “I’ve lived here for 12 years, walk the beach year round, but today I witnessed something I never could have imagined.”
Making the encounter even more special, McGee said she had just finished watching “My Octopus Teacher,” a Netflix documentary about a diver who meets an eight-legged friend under water.
“I do think this rare encounter was meant to be,” McGee wrote on Twitter.
Octopuses live in shallow marine waters off the shores of the United States. Along the East Coast, members of the common octopus species can grow to be about 3 feet and are known for their thinking and camouflage abilities, according to the National Wildlife Federation and the S.C. Aquarium.
“They have long and short term memory, have been taught behaviors and can learn to problem solve,” the aquarium wrote on its website. “Color cells in the skin are controlled by the nervous system and they can change their color very quickly and dramatically to blend in with their surroundings.”
McGee didn’t immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment about her encounter.
This story was originally published September 22, 2021 at 12:02 PM with the headline "Beachgoer picks up shell — and finds a tentacled surprise, South Carolina photos show."
