In differently aged cuttlefish, we used an associative learning paradigm with negative reinforcement to estimate the short and long-term memory abilities (STM and LTM) during animal life span. We observed an early post-embryonic maturation of the STM (up to 8 days of age). This phenomenon is confirmed by an increasing prey pursuit ability (involving STM processes) during the first week of life. The LTM progressively increases until 90 days of age, moreover, this maturation process in juveniles is highly dependent of the environment of rearing. Inversely, LTM performance crucially decreases in old animals. These variations of LTM abilities during development are associated with, in one side, the post-embryonic maturation of the vertical lobe complex in juveniles and, on the other side, with the occurrence of signs of degeneration in this highly associative brain structure in aging cuttlefish. We recently confirmed the functional implication of the vertical lobe complex in teaming and memory by the use of a metabolic marker (cytochrome oxidase) in adult animals. Further experiments of excitotoxic lesions of the vertical lobe associated with different learning paradigms are actually leaded in our laboratory.