This headline isn’t the start of a joke. Meet the first known six legged octopus.

Obviously it can’t be called an octopus, even though that is its species (actually a lesser octopus, Eledone cirrhosa). As the Daily Telegraph points out: “‘Octopus’ meaning ‘eight-legged’, it would be similar to talking about a ‘three-wheeled bicycle’.”

So staff at Blackpool Sea Life Centre have named it Henry the Hexapus. He ended up in their aquarium after being found in a lobster pot off the north coast of Wales, although they didn’t notice the missing legs until later.

Henry is thought to result from a genetic defect rather than an unfortunate encounter with something sharp.

“We’ve scoured the internet and talked to lots of other aquariums and no-one has ever heard of another case of a six-legged octopus,” says displays supervisor Carey Duckhouse (various, including Blackpool Gazette, AFP).

Image: courtesy of Blackpool Sea Life Centre