The role of cephalopods in the world’s oceans: an introduction

Abstract

The object of this volume is to summarize our present knowledge of the role of cephalopods in the oceans and adjacent seas. Only in the last three decades have we become aware of their ecological importance, and we are at present on the brink of an expansion of their utilization by man. The role of cephalopods in the life of man must depend ultimately upon their role in the ocean. Man poses the threat of a major predator from outside their ecosystem as he has with the fish, but cephalopods are very different from fish in many aspects of their life (Boyle & Boletzky; Rodhouse & Nigmatullin), and their commercial exploitation will bring about very different responses and pose very different problems. Man asks, ‘What can they give us?’ What he must also ask is, ‘What could we ultimately lose from their careless exploitation?’ This volume presents information upon which a first attempt to answer these questions can be based.