Colossal squid
The largest recorded specimen was captured in 2007 by a New Zealand fishing boat off Antarctica. It was initially estimated to measure in length and weigh . The squid was taken back to New Zealand for scientific study. A study on the specimen later showed its actual weight was , but it only measured in total length as a result of the tentacles' shrinking "post mortem".
Cephalopod size
Reports of giant squid ("Architeuthis dux") specimens reaching or even exceeding in total length are widespread, but no animals approaching this size have been scientifically documented in recent times (O'Shea & Bolstad, 2008; Dery, 2013; Yong, 2015). This is despite there being hundreds of specimens available for study ( 700 documented as of 2015, of which 460 measured in some way; Paxton, 2016a), including numerous recent examples, such as the 57 specimens recorded from Japanese waters over a 15-month period in 2014–2015 (Kubodera "et al.", 2016). It is now thought likely that such lengths were achieved by great lengthening of the two long feeding tentacles, analogous to stretching elastic bands, or resulted from inadequate measurement methods such as pacing (O'Shea & Bolstad, 2008; Roper & Shea, 2013:113).