Octopuses' colourful and violent relationships revealed in underwater footage

Researchers find octopuses, which are known for being solitary, are not above a little spat with the neighbours and have a complex social life when they coexist

They're more closely related to oysters than they are to mammals but it turns out octopuses are surprisingly similar to us when it comes to fighting with their neighbours.

Octopuses, renowned for surprising intelligence, were usually pretty solitary beings, said Peter Godfrey-Smith from the University of Sydney. "You do tend to see them on their own. And if you put two octopuses in a tank together you often end up with one octopus," he told Guardian Australia.