Ok, my remaining two octpouses (unfortunately #1, affectionately known as Blinky, died while I was away working of unknown causes. We think he might have been sick beforehand.) are doing just fine in their larger, now cycled tanks. I do worry, however, that they may be bored. I have lots of various shaped pvc pieces in the tank, and I know #2 (Clyde) likes to play in the air bubbles every so often, but the excitment of their surroudnings seems to have worn off. I know Clyde leaps after my hand every time I go to take a water sample or scrub the tank, but I think he gets upset with me when I won't let him eat it, lol. He has quite a grip!

Anyway, I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions as to what I might put in the tank to make things more interesting for them?

I clean the tank with a sort of "sponge on a stick", which Clyde seemed interested in the other day, and in which Inky (#3) showed mild interest. I am going to try a sponge tied to a pipe as a toy and see how they like it. Any suggestions would be welcome. I want to keep my octos happy!

bright, colourful children's toys seem to be the favourite. As long as they are made from nontoxic plastic, anything goes!

And they like playing with you, too! My bimac never cared for toys but liked me to play with her - the feeding stick, my hand, whatever.

Nancy

im worried about lettin mine grab my hand cause when i first got him i made the mistake of underestimating their speed when he was in the acclimation bucket.... he crawled his way up my arm to my elbow and then squirted me with water and crawled back down my arm into the bucket as if sayin "ha u bastard" ..... im scared once he gets ahole of me he wont let go and i dont wanna hurt him tryin to coax him into the water .... hes not the kind that just grabs u with a tentacle and messes around.... hes all or nothin and isnt scared to come all the way out of the water to do so....

Yeah, I'm kind of scared about letting him have my hand as well. #2 in particular loves to jump after my hand. He almost didn't let it go last time. What do you do? Do you just leave it in there until they decide to let go of it? Will they bite?

im sure thier instinct is not to bite u but they might..... i dont think a octo like mine with a mantle the size of a golf ball could really bite hard enough to hurt me...its just the idea

If you're talking about bimacs, it's not much of a bite! And they seem to do it only once, then they figure out you're not good to eat.

But most of the time you can control whether they get into a good biting position.

I'm attaching a pic of a bimac bite (husband's hand). He didn't try to stop Ollie from biting him.

Nancy

is the bite on the finger all the way to right on the knuckle??

No, it's the tiny mark where the fingers are spread apart, more to the left.

Nancy

oh i see.... thats not bad at all my ferrets would do wayyyyy worse damage than that..... well maybe i should slowly allow him to investigate my hand

Yeah, that doesn't look so bad. Thanks. Maybe I will try my hand more often. I offered my fingers to #2 today, but he didn't seem interested. I"m kind of worried. Maybe because I pulled away last time he's kind of skittish about it now. He hasn't been very active all day. But maybe he's just settling down now that I'm the person taking care of them again. Hopefully he will be more playful tomorrow.

i think my octo is on speed cause he swims around the tank often jetting from one end all the way to the other..... he always moves around and always comes to me as soon as i walk up to the tank..... he really likes the fish cause they follow each other around the tank all day..... im gonna try usin my hands to play with him soon

91lxstang, what kind of fish do you keep in the tank? Yr octo doesn't try to eat them?

I swear by Duplos, the big ones, my octo loves them.

I use the small type of legos, these baby toys that are plastic rings that attach to each other, and this little plastic lego cage that he LOVES to crawl in and play in.