How Many Hearts Does an Octopus Have?: 150 Fun Facts and Questions About the Ocean's Cleverest Creature for Curious Kids Ages 6-12

Three hearts. Blue blood. Eight arms, and not one tentacle among them.How does an animal with no bones squeeze through a hole the size of a coin? Why does swimming stop its main heart? And how does it match a color that scientists think it cannot even see?An octopus is about as different from us as a clever animal can get. Two thirds of its nerve cells are not in its head but down in its arms, so each arm works a good deal out for itself. This book answers 150 questions about how that actually works.Every question gets its own illustrated page, in language young readers can follow on their own. No walls of text, no lecture - just a question at the top, a hand-drawn diagram that genuinely explains the answer, and a "Did You Know?" fact at the bottom.Inside you will find out: - Why an octopus has three hearts, and what each one does- How it changes color and texture in less than a second- Why it has eight arms and no tentacles at all - and why almost everyone gets this wrong- Whether it really has nine brains (it does not, and the truth is stranger)- How one escaped an aquarium down a drainpipe and was never seen again- Why a mother octopus stops eating to guard her eggsTwelve chapters, 150 questions The Basics - That Amazing Body - Arms, Suckers and Tentacles - Three Hearts and Blue Blood - Changing Color and Disappearing - How Smart Is an Octopus? - Eating and Hunting - Ink, Escape and Defense - Baby Octopuses - Where Octopuses Live - Kinds of Octopus - Octopuses and People Written to be trustedEvery answer reflects what scientists have actually observed, including the ones where the honest answer is "nobody knows yet". Two of the best pages in the book - on whether an octopus sees color, and whether it dreams - end by admitting the question is unsettled. Nothing here is exaggerated to make a better story, because the real animal is strange enough.A note for parents: the page on venom says plainly that every octopus is venomous, and just as plainly that almost none are dangerous to people. The blue-ringed octopus gets its own clear warning: never touch one, never pick up any small octopus, tell an adult. The book also says honestly that octopuses make poor pets and that most sold have been taken from the wild. 150 questions. 150 answers. One animal that works everything out entirely alone.A perfect gift for curious, animal-loving readers aged 6 to 12.