WOW this is so great!!!!! My little cuttlefish arrived at 12:35 this afternoon, acclimation took over an hour, then he was released into the tank. He stayed on the bottom in the sandbed for a long time trying to get his bearings down. Around 6pm I put a guppy in the tank and he went up and caught it before i could get the net out of the tank :heee: Now he is stalking the small hermit crabs that are in the tank and flashing his colors. No ink problems as of yet, all is very well with little Cuttlebug :wink:

His mantle length is about 1" and from his eyes to tip of tent is about 1/2" so he is very small,,, this is way cool

Hey, wonderful news about Cuttlebug (like that name!).

Glad all went smoothly and that he's eaten. Didn't expect him to be so small - maybe this is a second generation of cuttlefish at Octopets.

Sounds like Cuttlebug is settling in very well.

Congrations on having the first Dallas area cuttlefish!!

Keep us posted, please.

Nancy

How exciting! I love the name! Do you think you will have pics soon?

And congrats!!!

Carol

thanks everyone :D I was so worried something would go wrong :roll: but it couldnt have gone better. Little Cuttlebug is so cute stalking the hermits its just to cute... I will take pics this weekend and get them posted :mrgreen: :rainbow:

AWESOME!!!!! Can't wait to see some pics...
greg

Ditto ^^ 8)


PIX!! :D

hehe what a cute name!! :P

Congrats on your new arrival and his smooth acclimation :heee:

Well overnight something terrible has gone wrong!!!!! This morning he is floating on top the water and his catching tent. is hanging out and he cant seem to get to the bottom of the tank. This is most disappointing. I dont think he will make it thru the day :( :cry: All params are good. I just dont understand. There is nothing in the tank that can hurt him. I even turned the power heads off so he wouldnt get hurt. This is so dissapointing.

Sorry to hear about cuttlebug.

It sounded like he was doing so well.

Very sorry to hear this. I wish I could offer some advice, but I don't know what's wrong.

Nancy

Well here it is 11am and he is still hanging in there :) He has regained the ability to get to the bottom of the tank and his catching tent. seems to have slight movement in it and it is also changing colors, I didnt not know that those tent could also change colors :P Right now he is buried in the sand bed and just resting, maybe there is a chance he might make it. I just dont know.....

Hang in there Cuttlebug!!! Hopefully, it will just be some shock from the transfer...best wishes!
greg

:cry: Sad to say that Cuttlebug just passed away :cry:

Very sorry to hear about Cuttlebug. :angelpus:

Nancy

wow...that really sucks. Sorry about the cuttle...we have all had similar experiences with animals, especially cephs...but it doesn't make it any easier... :(
greg

Really sorry to hear about Cuttlebug :cry:

:( So sorry to hear. Maybe he was too stressed from shipping. Maybe see if they will replace him?

Carol

Yes they will replace him, but im really not sure that im up to really having a cuttle :( Jack said that i should really take another cuttle but would give me store credit if i wished. He also asked me to think about getting another octo :? He was very nice and understanding. Right now Im just wondering what the heck went wrong in my tank or was it just stress :goofysca:

DAMN U FEDEX AND UR STRESSFUL SHIPPING METHODS!!!!!!!!!!! Hey dont worry its probally not u.... I really suck at keeping fish and I had an octo and taught it to eat from my hand. And I think having a cuttle would be awesome! Go ahead and get another, take advantage of ur position! Good bye cuttle bug I didn't know u well.... :cry:

Could it be temperature problems? When you said it couldn't get away from the top, it sounded like OM's bubble problem.

Sorry when I said it couldnt get away for the top i meant .. it couldnt..... It would try to swim to the bottom but as soon as his little jet went off his "butt" would begin to float and up he went. after about 4 hours he seemed to get his gases balanced and finnally got to the bottom and thats when he died with in a few hours... I think having his retractable tentcls hanging out was really a bad thing. I talked to Jim at octopets and he said this was a sign of it dieing,,, either copper poising from the guppy he ate or severe stress.. I am almost 99% sure the guppy was copper free(i raise them myself, both SW and FW) I feed them to my other octos. He also remained solid white until the tent. came out then lost all ability to control color flashing. I explained this to Jim and he said that I should get another one and that maybe it was stress :confused: any opinions are welcome

The only advice I can offer at this point is to acclimate the new cuttle in a dim environment...not dark, but poorly lit...sometimes it seems like all of the surrounding activity in the new place freaks them out to the point of panic, and resulting demise. Really sorry about cuttlebug...

The tentacles are bad signs, I watched my last one die this way, it was at the top with tentacles hanging out and then it inked and its eyes dilated.

So sorry to hear about cuttlebug. It still sounds like bubbles to me. Problem is stress can set off bacterial infections and then the bacteria produce gas....................and so on. Also things like guppies can be born with internal parasite (flukes etc). We lost our Tuatara, Toots. through internal parasites picked up from our own raised feeder fish. This was devastating we'd had her for 60 odd years.

For those who don't know a Tuatara is a reptile of a very ancient lineage ( Sphenodon). They are unique to NZ and Highly endangered. They have no teeth but their jaws are serrated and the serrations pass through the gums and they have a pineal eye.

Sorry, I digress.........but it is possible that cuttlebug picked up something from the fish even though you raised it yourself.

Condolences :cry:

J

Jean,

As usual, you offer some interesting information and insights. I didn't know that stress could cause bacterial infections in cuttlefish.

Nancy

Jean,

As usual, you offer some interesting information and insights. I didn't know that stress could cause bacterial infections in cuttlefish.

Nancy

As a rule of thumb stress can cause bacterial infections in anything (including us!!) It seems to lower resistance (in humans prolonged stress can actually reduce the number of white blood cells ........baaaaaad!). I don't know if anyone's noticed but if you are stressed, at work, with kids, at christmas...you catch every cold or flu bug that is going (I know these are viruses!) and many people also get gastric bugs...these are often bacterial.

It seems to work in one of two ways, either the animal becomes more susceptable to bacteria in te enivironment and catch something, or the bacteria that is carried normally with no problems, begin to flourish with terrible effects.


J

You fed a tuatara fish? :shock: I think you're probably right Jean but could an infection take place and the gas form so quickly?

Excuse me for joining the conversation so late in the game, but I think that the problem is simply just shipping stress...

Its something that has been said since day one with transporting cuttles and looks to me like it is still a major hurdle. I dont think there is any blame with the seller and also i dont think that Debbie could have done that much more. But this goes right back to when i started keeping cuttles and seems to be running true.

Do we have a sucessful aclimatisation of a cuttlefish yet from the 2004 stock? In fact, anyone on seen anything on other forums?

I did the acclimation that came on the care sheet from fishsupply. Altho my first gut feeling was to abandon this 1 1/2 cup of tank water every 15 mins. until bag was full the drain bag and let animal loose, I did as instructed. I really feel that maybe a drip line and a long acclimation would have helped. Any thoughts to this......... maybe a new addition to the care instructions for cuttles could include something more concrete for acclimation. Im just grasping at straws here... sorry to babble :P

You fed a tuatara fish? :shock: I think you're probably right Jean but could an infection take place and the gas form so quickly?

Yup, she loved them!!!! It was only a treat, she normally got meal worms etc.

Yes an infection can set in that fast. We've had them set in only a matter of a hour after catching them. Stress is a terrible thing!


J