I weighed my options and decided to go with another octopus instead of getting cuttles, this time. So without further ado...

Introducing Grover. He's an Abdopus for sure. He's about 4 inches looks like... haven't gotten him out of the bag yet, he's acclimating to temp before I put him in a keeper and a bucket for the drip. Mantle's about grape size, maybe an inch.

He's going into our 60 cube since we relocated all the seahorses to Alayna's new 140 gallon. I've got a lot of work to do this evening!

:welcome: Grover

Welcome to Grover, I'm adding him to the List of Our Octopuses.

Where did you buy him?

Nancy

I got him from MarineDepotLive.com, $27, split shipping with Alayna as she wanted some tiny fish for her tank Came out at about $45 for me. Couldn't pass it up. I did email them asking for a picture and I never got a response. That was a bit annoying but I asked for the smallest one they had and Grover is about 1/4, maybe 1/3rd the size of the Abdopus I had at the clinic.

He's a keeper. ("He" for now until proven otherwise) I let him out of the critter keeper inside the tank and he immediately went under a rock. Arms searching this way and that. Then I saw him across the tank. Then I saw him over there... and then over there... foraging for pods, checking out his new place. Actually it's a lot like watching Kalypso's usual routine which is comforting. He's showing A LOT of the "passing cloud" effect. Can't wait to get video of that. Spectacular. Camera batteries died right after I filmed THIS:

http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_1998.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_1998.flv)

Yay! He's not skiddish!

He has 7 arms, 3 of which look like replacements (more pale than the others) but they are almost as long as the others.

How exciting! Welcome to Grover! I loved the startle when he grabbed your hand! They have quite a bit of strength even so tiny!

Awesome, good luck with G. The passing cloud effect is awesome, although I saw it from my hummelincki only twice, cool yours is doing it already.

:welcome: Grover!

:welcome: Grover! Love the name.

So TINY! Makes me sad about OP though. I hope he is as interactive. If I was not worried about why OP died, I would consider ordering one but I am going to let the tank sit a month before putting another octo in it.

Congats on grover!

Checkin me out... http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_2022.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_2022.flv)

Digging... http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_2023.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_2023.flv)

He is just tooo cute!

Isn't he? :) The battery on the camera died at the most inconvenient time so I didn't get to catch any of the neat stuff he did once he was in the tank.

There are 3 peppermint shrimps in the tank, all accounted for. I've seen them share the same space and he shows no aggression toward them. Yet. He accepted small silversides again last night.

Neal is getting me at least one backup battery and possibly an additional charger for a stocking stuffer :idea:. One of the many things I like about my current camera is that it take 4 double A batteries - I will miss the feature.

Neal is getting me at least one backup battery and possibly an additional charger for a stocking stuffer :idea:. One of the many things I like about my current camera is that it take 4 double A batteries - I will miss the feature.

4 days and the peppermint shrimps still all accounted for. So far the best I can tell Grover comes out around 9pm. I don't know how long he is active but he's usually perched on a rock somewhere when I go to bed. He usually comes out after the lights go out but doesn't seem to mind if I turn them back on. The lighting on this tank is 4x15 watt T-12 vho's for the sake of information.

I found out where he's been hiding out when he's not active. I noticed a small pile of dime sized pieces of rubble on top of a rock I hadn't noticed before. After I fed him tonight he climbed up onto another rock directly above the pile of rubble, and he slipped right into a crack about 1/4 inch wide. Next out came an arm holding yet another small piece of rubble, and he tossed it out, and it landed among the other pieces. I assume either A) he meant to use the rubble as a doorway for his den and because of the angle of the rock it isn't going where he wants it, or B) he's just making more room for himself inside his home.

Past 2 mornings Grover is out on the glass at 5am. No activity during the daylight as far as I can tell. He usually pops his head out around 9:30pm.

His legs are much longer than I realized, about 8 inches completely stretched out.

7:30am and he went to bed, pulled a rock in behind him. Can't really see it unless you watch full screen.

http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_2200.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_2200.flv)

Before disappearing into the hole inside the cave, Grover attempted to go to his usual resting place. But, there were no vacancies.

http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_2196.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_2196.flv)

Cute little guy!

Grover doing one of those neat Abdopus tricks...

http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_Grover_rock.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=Grover_rock.flv)

Can any of the Abdopus experts answer what exactly this behavior is? Seems to me like mimicry of sorts, be it mimicry of a rock, algae, crab or snail. Reminds me of cartoons... where the character disquises themselves in a box or bush or something like that... and you see their feet pop out, walk a few steps, stop, repeat.

Watching it several times over, I get the impression of "sounding" the substrate or scaring up pods.

Peek a boo!
http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_MVI_2269.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=MVI_2269.flv)

Growing back a missing arm.
http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/IMG_2317.jpg

I wished I'd had the camera ready a few minutes ago. Grover's grabbing rocks and whatever else he can and carrying them back to his den. The rock he just dragged back to his cave is considerably bigger than he is. This morning I had noticed a large gorgonian was shoved underneath the rocks and flat on the sand. Watching him move that rock was quite a sight.

He's so cute; I've been starting to miss octos lately. I guess it's time for another tank :). The video looks to me like he is mimicing a coconut that fell onto the seafloor.

Al does that thing, too, where he stops in a spot and digs his arms into the substrate, then just moves on. Sometimes he does it when he has been active then decides to watch me back, like he's making a stand to stare me down or something.

Grover is awesome and I love his name!

The part of the video I'm talking about is just the last 3 seconds or so. He tucks all his arms up underneath him and just scoots across the sand like "I'm a rock, I'm a rock, I'm a rock"... He does dig a lot too though.

You obviously need more camera time with Grover! Sounds like he's very entertaining to watch.

Grover has relocated every small piece of rubble, shells, and coral to his/her den. He/she has filled every hole with something. I hope this doesn't mean I will stop seeing him/her very soon but given the experience in the past, I won't hold my breath. I'll try to get a picture of the construction soon.

yeah i could use some pics because i want to ensure that my landscaping for the most part won't be tempting to rearrange. I like having lots of archs and i've constructed a den but i don't think it's octopus worthy. thanks

It won't matter how you arrange it. If it's not glued together chances are it will change over time. And the octopus will be the judge of the den location no matter how much effort you put into making one yourself.

AM, as I watch Al I notice more of that behavior you mentioned- it's that hovering movement that reminds my husband of the "Navigator" characters from the book/ movie Dune. He'll hover across the ground and then act as if he is snagged on something- but now that I think about it he always "snags" in front of a rock- maybe he is mimicing...

Al hasn't spent a lot of time rearranging the rocks in the tank, he seems only to need his one toy in a specific place. Maybe more easily moveable objects are enough. Before he moved in I arranged a den for him, a rather heavy clam shell in front of a curved piece of live rock. He seemed to get the idea immediately that it was his den. Do you think it helps to use some heavier pieces, or is Al just lazy compared to the rest of the octos out there?

AM, as I watch Al I notice more of that behavior you mentioned- it's that hovering movement that reminds my husband of the "Navigator" characters from the book/ movie Dune. He'll hover across the ground and then act as if he is snagged on something- but now that I think about it he always "snags" in front of a rock- maybe he is mimicing...

Al hasn't spent a lot of time rearranging the rocks in the tank, he seems only to need his one toy in a specific place. Maybe more easily moveable objects are enough. Before he moved in I arranged a den for him, a rather heavy clam shell in front of a curved piece of live rock. He seemed to get the idea immediately that it was his den. Do you think it helps to use some heavier pieces, or is Al just lazy compared to the rest of the octos out there?

I think it is rock mimicry. I remember one of the TED talks showing a behavior with a larger species of octopus (O. cyanea I think) where it was moving with the reflection of the light through the waves on the ocean floor. I haven't seen this behavior much since I got that footage (which was poor).

Haven't seen Grover in 2 days.

3 days, and I have seen no more than an arm rearranging a shell from inside a hole.

I guess he's a she and is preparing for eggs. *sigh*

4 days and no Grover sightings. When I got home from work however I did notice a rock had been wedged in a different spot and there is a lot of sand scattered over some of the live rock so apparently there was some sort of activity while I was gone. I'm having dejavu. I still drop in a piece of shrimp and hope to see an arm reach out and wrestle it away from a serpent star.

Well, a week and no Grover. I'll try to get video and pics of the babies whenever they hatch, if there are any. The base rock Grover took up residence in is about 30lbs and there's no way I'll be able to find out for sure, but I've seen this scenario before and I know how it plays out.

Too bad it's so soon. In about 3 months I should have an operational aquaculture facility set up in a spare bedroom, part of it specifically for cephs.

AM,
Would you consider journaling your design and setup of the aquaculture facility? We get a lot of questions about raising little ones and making food so this could be useful. Expecting seahorses soon too?

AM,
Would you consider journaling your design and setup of the aquaculture facility? We get a lot of questions about raising little ones and making food so this could be useful. Expecting seahorses soon too?

I will make a journal for building the setup perhaps in Tank Talk. It's not going to be anything too fancy at first. Planning on having 6-55 gallon tanks and I might go with a large rubbermaid tub for a central sump. I don't really like the idea of exposing all the tanks to each other and I'm not the most handy DIY'er but the overall water volume would be a big plus. It's mostly going to be corals but I want to diversify and include some cephs so I'll probably dedicate 2 of the tanks strictly to that. I'm thinking about trying to get Diver Tom to find me a brooding female briareus when the system is ready. Should be about that time of year for babies again.

Are you going to have a head tank? Had you considered putting a UV sterilizer in the return water line?

erin

Are you going to have a head tank? Had you considered putting a UV sterilizer in the return water line?

erin

UV sterilizers have proven to be a problem with ceph breeding. I might utilize one on my sps tank though.

free association thought:

bobtails deliberately culture symbiotic Vibrio bacteria for their photophores, and blue-rings culture another Vibrio species for their venom. Is it possible that UV sterilizers cause problems because other ceph species need other symbiotic bacteria for some less obvious purpose (like digestion? Mice, and likely people, that are carefully blocked from getting bacteria in their intestines don't actually develop their digestive systems properly...)

Welcome to Grover! :)

What happened when UV sterilizers were used? Was it conformation/behavior abnormalities or general die outs?

We have baby octos this morning. They look like transparent gnats floating about the tank. I'm going to stock up on planktonic foods after I drop Alayna off at the airport... she's headed out to San Francisco this morning, with the camera too so I got a tiny video clip in the dark to show the "snow" of babies.

Congratulations, Grover! Good luck, A.M.!

Excellent! :fingerscrossed: I will eagerly be awaiting the hourly (hunh? oh... ummm... daily? right. :wink:) -- make that daily -- updates!

I don't know where to start. I yanked all the chaeto from the refugium and put it in the tank, cut off the refugium pump. Mr. Wrasse is awake.. woke up between going to the airport and coming back... going to try to catch him... won't catch him, but he'll hide and probably stay hidden under the sand for quite a while so I won't have to worry about him eating them. Fish psychology.. hehe.

We have two 1 gallon containers, they're round but not spherical. I'm considering either A) drilling small holes in them for circulation and placing the babies in them... thinking the babies are just going to flow out of said holes. I could use mesh over the holes, but then I think the babies would just get stuck in that.
Or B) fill the containers with water from the tank, syphon out what babies I can into the containers and plug an air hose into them for circulation. Then I'll need to have plenty of water on hand for frequent water changes due to feeding...

I think B is the best option of the two...

I was not expecting this for another week or so. No matter how much reading I've done on the subject I was just not prepared for this at all. Honestly I'm contemplating the point of putting resources into this particular project knowing how unlikely success is.

Two quick questions for future reference... how long did the eggs take to hatch and what was the average water temp?

I think B is the best option of the two...


I think B is your best option too... If you can keep the surface area to water volume ratio high then you can get oxygen from the air. In other words, keep the water shallow...

Okay, thanks for the suggestion.

Little shooting stars..
http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/th_a87f0d7a.jpg (http://s249.photobucket.com/albums/gg231/thehippydaledo/?action=view&current=a87f0d7a.pbr)

:shock: They are really tiny.

Two quick questions for future reference... how long did the eggs take to hatch and what was the average water temp?

I don't know exactly when the eggs were laid. They hatched sometime during the night... between 11pm and 6am. From looking back at my posts Grover built the den 4 weeks ago, so I should have expected it this soon.

The tank temp ranges from 76 in the morning to 78 in the mid-afternoon.

:shock: They are really tiny.

Really they're bigger than I thought they would be. I can see their eyes and their syphon. No chromatophores that I can tell. They just look like little ghosts.

I think I'm going to buy 2 Koralia #1's and add to the 2 #2's that are already in there. The #3 is worrying me as it's pretty powerful. Seeing them getting sucked in... I've seen a couple of what I think might be dead smashed babies but I can't tell, possibly just debris of sorts. I'm going to aim for a circular current for now until I get the jugs set up.

I take that back. Some are firing up chromatophores. I had hoped maybe I was catching some that were eating, but upon closer inspection they do indeed have little red spots.

I caught probably 80. There are still a few more in the tank. I used a turkey baster to remove them. I won't try to remove all of them from the tank. I will just get lower powered pumps to keep the circulation in there.

:fingerscrossed: and congrats. Sorry I've procrastinated on creating a "raising octos from eggs" forum...

Thanks and no harm done.

I purchased frozen rotifers, cyclops, and a pack of live pods at the LFS. I have the local MAS on alert that I need some live tiny foods.

I put a few drops of each in the jugs. I am alternating the airline for now, so that they aren't constantly being pummeled. I may add some small holes to the line to let some pressure escape before getting to the end. I have lots of air pumps around here but they're all monsters.

I split them with the owner of my nearest LFS. They have a solid source for pods and a little experience of octopus keeping. I consolidated the ones I'm keeping into one container. The ones in the tank started thinning out quite noticeably so I captured those that I could find.

So far I haven't noticed any fatalities in the jug. Probably 60 of them if not more. When I see a few that appear dead on the bottom they jet off. I have the air hose set so that the water has a medium flow. After removing several ounces of water with the baster I added more live pods. Then I replaced the water I had taken out with new saltwater.

I'm seeing a few I'm pretty sure are dead now. For the most part though, I believe the majority are still alive.

A member of our local MAS that has an actual phytoplankton business gave me a couple of jugs of live motile phyto and some tubes of "Rutherford's" to culture... going to have to do some research on that and get those set up and going. I added a helping of the live phyto and increased the overall water volume in the jug to help dilute any waste. Going to do one more water change before bed and dose a little more phyto to keep food in the jug overnight.

Hope they make it through the night!

Seeing more babies popping up in the display now.

Do you think they are still hatching or that you are just seeing them?

Do you think they are still hatching or that you are just seeing them?

Well, for several hours after I picked the last that I could find out of the tank, I didn't see any. Now I just counted 6 clustered together. I think there's more hatching.

Man I wish I had endless water volume and an infinite supply of live phyto. I got about $50 worth of live phyto donated to the cause, yay. She told me I better make it work...:goofysca:. And an invitation by one of our MAS directors to do a presentation at next months MAS meeting. :shock:

Talk about pressure.

And all of us just hoping for more than 4 days :bonk:

And all of us just hoping for more than 4 days :bonk:

At this point I'll be happy for more than 24 hours. Before I was faced with the actual experience, I told myself I was just going to let it go, it's impossible, it would be a waste of resources...

Then they appeared. And I pointed them out to Alayna. And she said "Oh they're so cute!"...

Keeping fingers crossed for the little ones! How exciting!:smile:

Many did not live through the night. Still have a couple dozen. Did a water change first thing this morning. Added more live phyto.

I'm thinking the room temperature was too low for one thing. Might should have suspended the jug in the display.

AM, due to an undesireable extension of the life of a dying (old age) merc, something I have thought might have an effect would be to absolutely boil the water with air from an air stone. If you can pull a few off and have a container, it wouldn't hurt to try as it is unlikely that I will have eggs to experiment with any time soon. The experiementer in me would love to try to mate a pair of octos in my split tank but the hobbiest won't risk Serendipity. When we got the tank, this was a goal but not until I have kept a few more octopuses :oops:

Maybe a dozen or less left alive. Just got home from work. 9 hours with no water changes and additional food...

I just got my coral propagation system. Right next to it, in the corner of the room is an 6 sided tank, 60 gallons... would be easy to make flow in a circle... would be fairly easy to plumb into the prop tanks... Yes. Yes I think I will do that. Just for this purpose in the future.

Send me your pelagic pusses, people? :)

D, that's pretty much what I've been doing, without the airstone though. Just the end of the hose down in the bottom of the jug. I was afraid it was too rough... but I guess the ocean isn't all that gentle...

This sucks. I need to read more.

About 30 minutes ago Grover came out. I dropped in some clams on the half shell for her. On my way over to the tank she released the biggest cloud of ink I've ever seen from any of my octopuses. It seems her sense of smell isn't very good anymore. She had a hard time finding just one of the three pieces I dropped in, made a whole circle around one piece without noticing it. She looks very pale from what I could tell without the lights on.

D, that's pretty much what I've been doing, without the airstone though. Just the end of the hose down in the bottom of the jug. I was afraid it was too rough... but I guess the ocean isn't all that gentle...

This sucks. I need to read more.

Try a tiny shallow container with no flow (maybe floating in one of your tanks to maintain temperature).

Doing that now. Only found 2 survivors this morning.

2 survivors, still kickin.

...and then there were none.

:sad: You gave it a good try AM. Sounds like you have some good ideas to try next time though.

So sorry. :sad:

I hope we can figure out a way to be more successful with this eventually, but we have a long way to go.

Nancy

Grover's barely hanging on this morning. I saw an arm sticking out of a hole... serpent star is playing with it. Thought she was dead so I used the grabbers to get her and she yanked back weakly. I removed the rock in front of her and she is laying on her side but she pulled all of her arms in when I moved the rock... most likely will be dead when I get home from work. Bummer. Don't like starting my days like this.

Yes, but I think it is entirely possible and not that far out of grasp Nancy.

I should have split them into more containers and tried more methods. I'll be pondering upon the subject so I'm not so ill prepared next time. Oh yes, there will be a next time!

Yes, but I think it is entirely possible and not that far out of grasp Nancy.
...
Oh yes, there will be a next time!

:thumbsup:

sorry, but a valiant effort, and thanks for reporting the details.

I'm sorry to hear dale. Stay up there. I look forward to next month's meeting.

You had to try, even though you were sure you would fail - it's how we learn...

You had to try, even though you were sure you would fail - it's how we learn...

Yeah I wish I had gone with your suggestion from the get-go. While most of them died off during the bubbling, the last two lived considerably longer after I removed most of the water and floated the container.

I think the kitchen counter was one problem. Not insulated, temperature shift throughout the day was probably one of the many issues.
Time... too many hours away not providing food and clean water.

Food... what kind is going to be best? I've got live phyto, figured that was about as small as it could get, then I've got live rotifers, little bit bigger and eats the phyto. The jug was also stocked heavily with live copepods, about the size of the octo larvae's eyes. Thought all that would be a pretty good variety so if not one, then maybe another would suffice. I don't think they starved. I think the water quality was just trashed from adding so much. Of course I changed the water about every couple of hours while I was home.

I really think setting up the hex would solve a lot of the issues. The only thing is with 60 gallons of water, how do I make sure the babies are getting the food. Ocean water is saturated with lifeforms right? Can't maintain that AND water quality at the same time. (But this is where my new RO/DI system and tons o' salt buckets comes in I guess)

AM,
I kind of hope Steve will chime in here as he VERY briefly mentioned that water quality may not be all that important (as least for hatchling squid).

That's interesting D. I would love to hear Steve's take on it, been hoping I would.

PM him

Sorry to hear about the outcome AM.

Steve told me once that water quality isn't so important for the wee ones, but I wonder about the "phyto" I assume you mean phytoplankton? This is micro algae.....a plant and so may have been lacking in nutrients or at least the octopus digestive system may not be able to break down the cell walls to get at it, octopus metabolism is protein based and I suspect they needed much more protein. Maybe newly hatched pods? And remember most octopus (even newly hatched) can deal with prey bigger than themselves!

J

Thanks Jean. Yeah I was kinda skeptical about the phytoplankton, really wanted to find some live zooplankton, but she said it is guaranteed to be motile and if they wouldn't eat that then to add the rotifers and the rotifers could eat the phyto while the octos would be eating the rotifers... and the tiny pods.

Sorry sweety you sure tried.

Sorry to hear the outcome but thanks so much for bringing us all along for the ride! I know there will be a next time for you- there is a certain thrill to have those grenades flying at you...

sorry, that stinks