Pall Sigurdsson is a computer scientist whose recreational diving has brought him quite a few YouTube fans.

And while he enjoys diving in Iceland and is currently living in Zurich, Switzerland, he often makes it out to warmer waters. For example, Lambeh, Indonesia, where a video he filmed in December of 2018 and uploaded to YouTube in April of the following year has been viewed over 14 million times!

It stars an octopus with a cup on its “head.”

I’d like to be under the sea

Two winters ago, Sigurdsson and his dive mates spent an entire dive trying to persuade an octopus to make a trade.

Of course, divers have very limited time underwater, as dictated by their air tanks. But they decided it was worth it to save the little creature’s life.

In his video caption, Sigurdsson explains the scene:

“We spent a whole dive and most of our air saving this octopus from what was bound to be a cruel fate. The coconut octopus, also known as veined octopus, is born with the instinct to protect itself by creating a mobile home out of coconut or clam shells.”

The coconut octopus in question, however, used what it had available instead of a clamshell. And thanks to humans, that happened to be a plastic cup that had sank to the bottom of the sea. Its instincts said “make a home” but not “be choosy about the materials.”

In the octopuses garden

A plastic home was going to be a big problem for this octopus (and probably for any creature that came along to scoop it up).

Without the protection of a shell, the coconut octopus is merely a tasty 2-second snack to passing eels and other big fish. He would have easily been swallowed up.

And adding insult to environmental injury, whatever passing fish needed a meal would have likely eaten the plastic, “most likely also killing the predator or weakening it to a point where it will be soon eaten by an even bigger fish,” according to Sigurdsson.

So they proposed a trade. And it really took a lot of effort. After all, the little creature thought someone was trying to steal his home.

Octopuses are extremely intelligent, but that’s a lot of information to put together. They’re also pretty particular about their shells, it seems, even when someone is offering them an upgrade.

“We found this particular octopus at about 20 meters under the water, we tried for a long time to give it shells hoping that it would trade the shell. Coconut octopus are famous for being very picky about which shells they keep so we had to try with many different shells before it found one to be acceptable,” Sigurdsson said in his caption.

Alas, their efforts were eventually a success.

Now he has some shade

Being able to see the whole scene play out made viewers think hard about what the coconut octopus might have been thinking.

“Imagine this from his perspective, some giant creature he may have never seen before comes up and just starts sitting little shells around him to try out. I bet the other Octopi won’t believe him,” one viewer joked.

Others were touched by the effort:

“Why is no one talking about the fact that a WHOLE TEAM of divers were just scouting the ocean floor for shells for one little octopus? That’s so cute and wholesome.”

Be sure to scroll down below to view the underwater bargaining.

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Source: Bored Panda, YouTube – Pall Sigurdsson, pall.sigurdsson.is