A female octopus can guard her eggs for over four years without eating

 It's one of the most selfless acts of parenting in the animal kingdom.

 In 2007, researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute discovered a female deep-sea octopus (Graneledone boreopacifica) clinging to a rocky ledge nearly 4,600 feet below the surface in Monterey Canyon. According to MBARI and CBS News, she had just laid about 160 eggs, and she never left them again.

Over the next 53 months, scientists returned 18 times and found her in the same spot, gently cleaning the eggs, fending off predators, and refusing food, even when crab meat was offered by robotic arm. Her body slowly deteriorated: her skin sagged, her eyes clouded, and her mantle shrank. But she stayed until the eggs hatched, then vanished, presumed dead. This is the longest known brooding period of any animal on Earth.