FIGHT WITH AN OCTOPUS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2990, 30 January 1917, Page 4

FIGHT WITH AN OCTOPUS

a :— WARNING TO BATHERS/ As was stated in these columns last; week, octopuses are unusually numeroui in the harbour this summer. This was brought home to some people in a very unpleasant way on Sunday. A boy of six years, named Raymond Roberts, son of Mr. Arthur Roberts, manager of the Victoria Laundry, was engaging in a dip in the lfater among the rocks in a little cove in Evans Bay, between the Patent Slip and Point Jerningham. The boy was coming out of the water, when he appeared to stagger. Thinking he had only slipped, the boy's aunt (Mrs. Juriss) did not take particular notice,- until the hoy began to shriek. On rushing tajfihe spot, the boy's mother and aunt were terrified to see that an octopus had seized the lad's leg. They commenced to pull the boy, and eventually both boy, and octopus were landed, and tha> latter was dispatched with a sheath' knife. It was found to measure Bffc from tip to tip of its sucker-lined feelers. At about 7 p.m. on Sunday, a young'' woman who was bathing at Island Bay was seized by an octopus, but managed to shako it off, thanks to the sandy nature of the bottom, which gave no grip to the marine assailant. So eager was the octopus after its prey that it came close 1 enough into shallow water to be hooked up on the beach with a crook stick, and there killed. The span of its feelers was about) 8 feet. To many who have fished the waters of the harbour and entrance during the last month it' is a common thing to get an octopus on the line. 'Ohlybn Sunday morning two men fishing off Paul's Point, Karaka Bay, drew up two of the species. One slipped off.the line when Drought to the surface. The other was hooked, and had to he cut away with a knife.