The Council of Agriculture (COA) on Tuesday shared tips on how to differentiate a blue-ringed octopus from other species, after reports that someone might have purchased the venomous creature at a market in New Taipei City.
A person on a local Tamsui District (淡水) Facebook group last month posted a warning about their purchase from a neighborhood seafood vendor.
After bringing the batch of octopuses home, the poster realized that one looked different from the others and did not cook it.
The person was later told it was a blue-ringed octopus, a small but highly venomous species characterized by the neon blue rings that dot its body.
The story gained traction in local media, which also reported that it carries enough toxin in its small body to kill 26 people.
The vendor told reporters that since small edible octopuses are sold in batches, it was not noticed before the customer made the purchase.
Although it looks similar to other species when dead, the octopus can be identified by the blue rings on its body, the council said earlier this week.
When alive, the octopus has striking blue and black rings running along a yellowish body, it said, adding that the rings turn deep brown when it dies, making it harder to differentiate from other types.
Hwang Deng-fwu (黃登福), a professor at National Taiwan Ocean University’s marine toxins laboratory, said that blue-ringed octopuses are often mistakenly caught by fishers, as they are only about the size of a person’s thumb, adding that they easily arrive on market as they look similar to edible types of octopus.
Two people in Taiwan since 2020 have been sent to emergency rooms for accidentally eating a blue-ringed octopus, Hwang said.
Eating one or two is unlikely to result in lasting consequences, but three could be fatal, Hwang said, adding that eating one would likely cause the mouth, lips and tongue to go numb within a minute or two.
As ambulances in Taiwan usually deliver people to a hospital within half an hour, there is enough time for treatment while the body metabolizes the toxin, he said.
However, waiting until there is difficulty breathing to seek treatment would likely be too late, he added.
For instance, if a diver is bitten by one and cannot receive treatment for two or three hours, it could be fatal, although most divers are aware of the risk, he said.
Regarding the claim that one octopus could kill 26 people, National Museum of Natural Science Biology Department associate researcher Lee Kwen-shen (李坤瑄) said that it refers to the amount of venom it contains, which has the ability to completely paralyze a victim and make it difficult to breathe without medical assistance.
The waters around Taiwan have the same types of blue-ringed octopus found around the Philippines and Australian Great Barrier Reef, with venom that is just as potent, as well as two others that have yet to be analyzed, Lee said.
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