Your mention of shifting color patterns in Cephalopods reminded me of an interesting experience a couple of years ago. I was doing some intertidal collecting up at Manomet, near Plymouth, Massachusetts. It's a typical cold water, rocky tidal pool habitat. In one little sand pocket among the rocks, containing perhaps two or three cups of water, I noticed a sort of sparkling or iridescence in the water. Even when I got my face right down there, I couldn't tell what I was looking at. I scooped up a double handful of water, and the water in my hands continued to sparkle with multicolors. When I got the light just right, I could see that there were tiny, almost transparent organisms swimming around in the water. And they were pulsating (that's the only word that describes it) with ever-changing iridescent color - blue, green, red, and what I can only call silver and gold. It was just fascinating. I still couldn't tell what they were. Finally I let most of them trickle back into the water whence they came, but a couple of them stuck to my hand, and once they were out of the water I could see that they were newly hatched squid (probably Loligo pealei, our commonest local species). Each one looked fully formed, with fins and tentacles, and each one was about 1 cm in overall length. I wished I had my camera, but it would have been difficult to shoot, and besides, a still photo could never have captured the effect of colors coming and going, changing from one hue to another. Paul M.