I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this but.
I was parusing the "big auction" web page and found this listing.

"You are bidding on 3 half doller sized live octopuses. These are common octopus Octopus vulgaris. Class; Cephalopda Order; Octopoda.

These guys have been coming out of the live rock I collect at work. They are hardy eaters and will be the size of a baseball in a year. These octopus make a great addition to any tank, however they would go best in a small nano type tank with one or two rocks in it.

I am also sending 10 red cling crabs Mithrax forceps and 10 narises snails for food. They will also clean up your tank. This is several months worth or food. The octopuses also eat frozen fish and shrimp as well as live gold fish, live shrimp, snails and crabs."

I don't know about his Vulgaris,but my "Vigo" would NOT be a great addition to ANY tank,wouldn't last two weeks in a nano tank, and would eat ALL those crabs in about two days. Im not too sure bout the snails.

I only hope that all the people that are bidding on them know more than the seller. Anyone else have any thoughts bout this?

Where did you find this?

Its a listing on Ebay.
Heres the link. Please tell me that I'm misreading it!

URL: http://cm.ebay.com/cm/ck/1065-29298-3840-0?uid=28300773&site=0&ver=ONA080805&lk=URL&Item=140045146276

Afraid not. Its real. Someone report him ASAP. Heres what I think of this.

"These octopus make a great addition to any tank"? Yeah, I'd bet they'd do great in my 45 gallon reef tank with my yellow tang, maroon clowns, fusi goby, hermits, and electric scallop!

"When they get older they will devolpe blue rings around there eyes"
That's a bimac then.

"however they would go best in a small nano type tank with one or two rocks in it"
I think they might need A LITTLE MORE THAN THAT. I would say oh, at least 90 gallons more

And of course, he gives no info about things like salinity, temp, the fact that a protein skimmer is ALMOST REQUIRED

And finally, to end my rant
"You are bidding on 3 half doller sized live octopuses"
3? And I suppose he says to put them all in the same tank. Yeah, they'll do fine! They'll be great friends! Friends that eat eachother!YAY!

Here is how you report this type of activity... ebay allows the sale of fish and certain snails. Since octopus do not fall into this category, they are not allowed to be sold on ebay. You can report to this link with the item number. I did!

http://cgi1.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?InlineSelfHelpWebForm&userid=&UsingSSL=0&siteid=0&partnerid=2&wftype=7b6576419713e1e8&messageID=4ed620cea49cfb6f&replyTo=4ed620cea49cfb6f&subject=effb155ac12884a9cb7f30f3d46d2f10 86754dfab974f65c6f847160e26aff7c&bcrumb=e8cea7277b0917a527ed0c499613520a6 c41520eccc0326581dd7af9af46e7bb83b67737a 107c143ff342d969d784ad7550c9953299ad9eb3 d77620f3d3dd4dbc3e7305111e49ae1d65820c79 108744df587e42eadaaa7f58ac122ef37eb8fe57 57d6d2cb821025d&rcode=bc34c03d37ae934db777664042292bb0&instruction=&expirationDate=&err=0&dstURL=&bshowgif=false&bc1=default&bc2=default&bc3=default&bc4=default&bc5=default&bc6=default&bh1=default&bh2=default&bh3=default&bh4=default&bh5=default&bh6=default&history=default&rdir=0

They are from Tampa, so they are definitely not bimacs. The common octopus in LR from Tampa is O. mercatoris. They would be about this size in the late fall and will breed next spring. Theywill not last more than another six months.

Roy

Thanks cuttlegirl -- reported!

I'm glad to see that people are taking action on this. I've just finished filing a report myself. The "buyer" emailed me and asked me if I wanted to purchase the exact same items for 129.99!!!! I asked him just how many he had since he ALREADY has another auction up 3 MORE!!!
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140047609848&ssPageName=MERC_VIC_ReBay_Pr4_PcY_BID_IT&refitem=140045146276&itemcount=4&refwidgetloc=closed_view_item&usedrule1=CategoryProximity&refwidgettype=cross_promot_widget

Somebody please tell me that there's something more we can do!!!

I reported him again, with the different item number...:smile:

I pity whoever buys it and find a very nasty suprise that their tank can't handle the poor octo...which most possibly leads to the octo escaping and drying up on the pavement or eaten by tankmates...or dying from less than optimum water perimeters due to the octo itself. D: Not good.

Has anyone pmed this guy?Maybe a link to our site so he could look into information here?Maybe he would change his auctions and info.If no one has i will!:sad:

I sure would hate to see some one try and stick 3 of these guys in a 6g nano who knows what species they are this makes my blood boil!!!!!!

I have reported both auctions plz report him if you have a ebay account!
They have not removed them yet if enough people report him they should remove it!

I've reported his second listing also. He emailed me through ebay and told me that he has 200 of them for sale/auction!! I sent him one back with a link to this site and asked him to please change his information on the care for these guys. I have yet to get a response back from him on my request.

He is either Diver Tom (www.divertom.com) or stole his pictures...

more likely stole the pictures

Yep, I PM'ed him, and he's not Diver Tom. I "politely" pointed out to him that stealing other peoples' pictures can lead to serious consequences.

Yep, I PM'ed him, and he's not Diver Tom. I "politely" pointed out to him that stealing other peoples' pictures can lead to serious consequences.

Did he respond at all?

Nope. It was pretty late that I sent it though.

lokk where he says "they would go best in a small nano type tank with one or two rocks in it."
yeah, right teil be per-friggin-ly happy in a tank twith nowhere to hid.

EDIT: someone won the action. someone here who knows their octo struff needs to get in contact with him and tell him how to properly care for his octo.

chris

He is not Diver Tom i have also linked him to this site and this post but no response.:goofysca:

Well I emailed him with a link here AGAIN but still no response. In fact the only responses I did get from him was asking if I still wanted to buy some and that he had 200 of them to sell!

First of all, the seller is not stupid. He is getting more that $40 each for juvenile octopus that he is collecting as bicatch and basically cost him nothing.

So he miss-identified the species. While they are probably O. mercatoris, almost every collector in Florida gets the identification of octopus wrong. You want an octopus, you get an octopus. I would venture to say that a majority of octopus sold are incorrectly identified starting at the high end where for $400 you can buy a mimic which isn't a mimic but wonderpus.

And as for his description of rearing and maintaining these juveniles, he didn't say anything that wrong. A juvenile O mercatoris can easily survive and thrive in a 5 gallon system and they do quite well with a single rock or shell to hide under. There was also the suggestion that it could be added to a reef tank. Great! Those are basically the conditions from which they were collected - Live Rock.

I've been watching this thread all day trying to figure out why people are so exercised by this posting. So perhaps the guy lifted a picture. We all know that this happens all the time. I find my images scattered all over the new and honestly, if I post a picture I have no expectation that this won't happen. Sure it is illegal and wrong, but it can't be the reason that people are so upset.

Bottom line is that the guy is doing what many LFS do, providing octopus for a high price with incorrect information about what they are and how to best care for them. I don't see general condemnation exploding in their direction.

So why is it that this seller is receiving so much criticism? I really don't get it. If you want to attack someone for really doing harm, go after the expensive retail shops selling Wunderpus (and the occasional mimic) for $400 +. Believe me, fields of cultured live rock in Florida are producing lots of O. mercatoris - far more than will survive to become adults and reproduce. I wish we could say the same about shallow bays in Indonesia that have a few "zebra" octopus that are barely hanging on in polluted, over-fished waters.

So perhaps the guy lifted a picture. We all know that this happens all the time. I find my images scattered all over the new and honestly, if I post a picture I have no expectation that this won't happen. Sure it is illegal and wrong, but it can't be the reason that people are so upset.

Sometimes even videos get stolen :D

I think its fair to report him to eBay because selling octos is against their rules--but three pages of posts? It would appear most of the repeat contributers are young'uns beating their chests.

Then again, I can't sleep and am just up looking for trouble! :)

Dan

So suggesting 3 octos in a 6 gallon tank is not that wrong? Wow, i'm so sorry I disagreed...

He contacted me back, and he said that they are dwards, and that he actually has one right now which has been housed for over a year in a 20 gallon. He also said that he has 25 (I think) in a 30 gallon tank. They are most likely juveniles. he said that they get along great, and don't cannibalize. He said that the company doesn't really do anything about them, so he scoops them out, takes them home, and tries to save them. he said he doesn't have 200 right now, but he could easily get that many if someone wanted a large number.

And as for his description of rearing and maintaining these juveniles, he didn't say anything that wrong. A juvenile O mercatoris can easily survive and thrive in a 5 gallon system and they do quite well with a single rock or shell to hide under. There was also the suggestion that it could be added to a reef tank. Great! Those are basically the conditions from which they were collected - Live Rock.

Your post touches on something I'm curious about. I know I'm far less qualified than most around here in terms of actual cephalopod husbandry, but I've noticed that there has been a pattern around here lately of taking the "TONMO ceph care guidelines" as canon. I certainly think the collective experience of TONMO ceph keepers should never be dismissed, and some of the reactionary responses is clearly we frequently get people coming in and pushing adversarial positions in an argumentative, rather than dialog, style. But I certainly respect Neogonodactylus's experience as well, for example, and in the other recent thread, Alex pointed out that a different style of keeping bimacs (including, but not limited to, lower temperature) seems to extend their lifetimes. I suspect it may be time to take a step back and ask the question "how much of what we're recommending as known to work is absolute, and how much may be just repeating choices that are known to work, but may not be better than other approaches?" I know when communities reach a certain stage of growth, the wariness of things "not invented here" can lead to a certain kind of close-mindedness and xenophobia.

I'm wary of posting this, because I have a great deal of respect for the collective wisdom of the TONMO ceph keepers, but I also don't want to deny the possibility that we're swinging a bit in the reactionary direction more than balancing between that and open-minded. Of course, I also really understand the frustration that comes up when people aren't following good practices with their ceph tanks, so I certainly don't want to discount the great advice that you all give people who are new to the hobby, I just encourage taking a moment to check perspective... If someone other than Roy had said that any octopus could thrive in a 5 gallon tank, I predict people would have jumped all over them.

The collective TONMO recommendations don't necessarily construct a canon--rather a series of observations of keeping octopus in a home setting, cemented together by common sense.

I'm certain its possible to keep a pygmy octopus in a 10 gallon tank, especially under the lab conditions of Dr. Roy. Three complications, though:

1) Most of us want to give it extra room to explore and do our best to modify the animal's behavior to spend more time outside its den (this is the reason we bought it in the first place).

2) Most of the people who come through here and want to keep an octopus in a small tank are coincidentally incompetent.

3) Dr. Roy can tell a pygmy octopus from not-a-pygmy octopus!

I'm almost sorry I started this post. I never expected it to draw this much attention-although I'm glad others have contacted him. He responded to my emails and obviously has read this post. I'm wondering if he sent the same email to everyone who contacted him.
I started this post because of the discription that he had in his auction. Everything sounded so factual-I admit I've had my Vigo for several months and I'm still not 100% sure what species he is.
If he knew they were dwarfs,then why does he state that they're Vulgaris? Unless I'm mistaken Vulgaris are definitly not dwarfs.
Dan the marine man,if you're out there,I applaude you for saving the octopus and I hope you'll continue doing so. I just hope that you change your discription. Feel free to email me again-I'm always up for talking to a fellow ceph fanatic

I think the biggest problem is that we all come here to study up on them before we get one.On ebay people will impulse buy not knowing what they are getting into!If i came across his post and knew nothing about them from his descreption i would buy these guys for my reef tank and by the time it was all over i would have no cleaning crew and who knows how much people have spent on there fish.I would be very upset if my livestock started to vanish.Who knows what kind of stinging corals and anemones the people buying them have.He also does not state if they are day active or nocturnal.Just my thoughts on it

Dutch

The person who is selling these octopus has joined Tonmo (I noticed he registered). So some good may come of this. He may have experience that we don't have and obviously he is trying to find a home for these animals. We may all have something to learn.

This is the email that i sent to all the people that contacted me through ebay. I thought i would post it for all to see.

In responce to your posted comments:
I dont have 200 but i would get them if i thought a buyer wanted them. That is what you were pretending to be. I have over 25 of them in my 30 gallon tank, 18 of them in a 20 gallon and they all get along. Its a joke to think that someone would put these tiny octos in a 100 gallon tank. You would NEVER see them. You people have no idea how small they are. I am telling people that are looking at my auctions what they can put these octos in now. Not what they should be kept in a year or so. I have given several octos to friends. They were all kept in tanks 20 gallons and smaller. They all did fine. I dont use a lot of rocks in the tank because they hide all day. Who wants to pay $100 on octos they never see? They seam to get along fine in my tanks. When i collect them from my tank to ship, i often find four or five of them hideing under the same rock or shell. The small ones im selling have never ate one of my fish nor my friends fish. I have it stated very clearly in my auction that they do eat live crabs,shrimp,snals and fish. I never told anyone to cram them all in a 6 gollon tank. It does not say that nowhere in my auction. Last time i checked they made nanos in sizes up to 30 gallons. Im not the asshole you guys make me out to be. I saved every one of thoes octos from sure death. If i didnt take the time to collect them from the rock we collect they would be dead in the bottem of a cooler. Even after my effort to save them all, several die on every trip we make. The other guy that collects the rock around here makes no effort to save the octos he get in his rock. Thats how i was gonna get 200. This is what i do to make money, its how i pay my bills. If someone wanted 200 of them and i could make 2g's with little effort. Iwould do it. Does this make me a bad person??I love my octos and i have had one for over a year in a 20 gallon and he does have blue and red rings around his eyes. As far as nameing them goes... Im a scuba diver not a marine biologiest.Its funny how you guys know more obout my octos than i do. I used that pic because my camra is broken and i didnt have any on file. I did not know this was such a big deal. I will take my own pic for the next auction and i will think about rewording it. I have been offering people three octos in my auction so they will save on shipping. Who wants to pay $50 to ship one octo?? I dont think that most of the people who posted these comments even read my auction. The best part is that three of the people who posted this negative shit about me contacted me and payed top doller to get one. Thanks for the free advertising.You guys should be asking me how you can help find these guys homes or how i can help you get all kinds of cool rare stuff. I can also get all kinds of live crabs,shrimp,and snails to feed your octos. Stop being kids and stop posting negative comments about me.
Thanks!!
Danthemarineman

Hi Dan,

Welcome to TONMO.com! :welcome:

Thanks for clarifying how you're catching and selling these octopuses.
We have a lot of people on this site who are not only interested in octopuses, but are also very fond of them and want to make sure they're treated well.

Actually, people do pay $50 all the time to ship one octopus! Maybe you also have small crabs people could order at the same time to make the shipment more cost-effective.

Do you have a website or do you sell wholly on EBay?

Nancy

Nancy
I do send crabs and snails for the octopi to eat in all my auctions.
I do most of my selling on the phone, at ebay and to local shops. If anybody wants one they can send me a private message.
Thanks!!
Dan

:welcome: Dan i am glad to see you have registered here i guess we did kinda of attack you.I would like to say sorry for that like Nancy said people will pay $50 for shipping for one octo i just paid $100 to get one bimac from marinebio_guy becuse of his reputation here.I always see post for people looking for pygmy's on here so this is a good place to be:wink:.When i saw Octopus vulgaris in your post thats what upset me under the tank conditions you had listed is why i got worked up but now that we know they are more then likley dealing with a dwarf species makes more sense.Maybe when you get your camera back up you can post some pics for a good ID here.I think everyine is leaning towards O. mercatoris if collected from Florida.We just want is best for the animal.Glad to have you here and hope you except my apology.

Thanks Dutch

Hi gang, (Thanks Nancy for flagging this one up :wink: )

I'm not going to get into the rights and wrongs of selling cephalopods on eBay. eBay rules clearly state the animal species which can be sold on its site and octopuses do not come under the acceptable 'items' list. It's in black and white. They shouldn't be sold on eBay and that's an issue for them to look into. More on that later.

I use eBay a lot. And I have bought many species of live fish via some very good sellers and I have also sold many juvenile species in return. My take on it is this...

It has made many species of fish and items of equipment available to people who otherwise might not have the chance to keep them. I have managed to get my hands on some 'rare in the trade' killifish for example and the Corydoras nijsseni I have been selling are also pretty rare to find. All in all I have to say that eBay has been a good thing for me. Some people may have had negative experiences. (I did lose money on a pair of leopoldi stingrays I bought which the seller didn’t actually have but PayPal got back 90% of it back for me)

If eBay change their rules and accept octopuses as 'legal' then I don’t mind. As Roy points out, the liverock they are coming out from is farmed rock, not natural. The octopuses are just a byproduct of a good man-made environment and essentially farmed too. Fair enough I say.

It’s not comparable to selling ‘zebra’ octopuses or even, and think about this one for a minute… all the octopuses that are wild caught in nets all over the world and sold as food for human consumption. I buy them, and squid, to feed to my large carnivorous fish species… and me from time to time!!!

I make money from animals and don’t have an issue with anyone else doing that either.

Here’s the crux of the matter -

We love our cephalopod pals and don’t like to think of them being mis-sold, misunderstood and mistreated. I think it's great that people are looking out for them and fair play to the people who object to them being sold on eBay (they are in the right in regards to eBay rules) but we shouldn’t slam people before getting all the information.

Dan has kindly joined and said his part and we should respect that, I hope you (Dan) hang about and share with us your octopus knowledge, you are very welcome here.

I don’t think it is responsible selling if you can’t properly ID the animal you are selling and that goes for divers and marine biologists. Not targeting Dan specifically but all the LFS’s in the world too who have even sold me blue rings marked as vulgaris etc! There is a (literally) huge difference between 3 mercatoris and 3 vulgaris (several lbs worth I would guess LOL) that would be like me selling a fish as ‘catfish’. It might grow to 2cm or 2 m long??? I think the advert should be more specific about species.

Sorry if this next bit is boring to all the original TONMO.com members but here it is again for the new people, many of whom I have never had the chance to converse with...

Keeping cephalopods as pets is not altogether a new idea but it’s STILL in its infancy when compared to other aquatic hobbies. It is correct to say that guidelines needed to be tweaked from time to time and we haven’t always been 100% right, but all in all, very close.

Monty asks about the collective TONMO knowledge and it’s a fair point. Where did all the information originally come from? Well, initially it was James Woods, Roy Caldwell, Chris Shaw, ‘Jimbo CephJedi’ and me that had monopoly on all online information.

At the time that was fine, it was a starting point based upon many years of keeping aquatic organisms, lab work, working in LFS’s, public aquaria and zoos. Most of it was common sense, transferable experience and a little trial and error.

We all know that nothing counts better than experience does and over the years I have kept many species and many more individuals and from that, along with new cephalopod friends that I made, we put together the initial guides for minimum husbandry. Most of it I am confident enough to say that I still agree with, even years later.

But, what works for one person might not work for another. That is the problem.

It might sound hypocritical but my advice to a new potential octopus keeper and how I would actually do it in practice are quite different things. The guidelines set out by our husbandry articles are just that, guidelines. NOT rules set in tablets of stone.

That said, they have proven to be a lifeline for many a captive cephalopod and should be stuck closely too until you have the experience. The rules can be tweaked but you’d do very well not to break them. There’s not much in the articles different to keeping any other large aquatic marine predator in home aquaria.

Could I personally keep a mercatoris in a 3gal tank with no skimmer? Probably yes.

Would I advise a newcomer to the hobby to try it? Absolutely not! It takes a long time to get used to the intricacies of marine animal husbandry.

Would I advise anyone keeping 3 unknown species of octopus in one tank not knowing what species they are? No. that is irresponsible.

Yes, there are shades of grey.

Take the guidelines, read them, learn from them, keep cephalopods that way and then with experience you can take it new places. This isn’t a closed book. Feel free to offer suggestions when you think the guides can be updated. Feel free to write your own articles and send them to us. Feel free to enjoy the hobby and not get bogged down in bickering (young’uns chest beating? lol)

Your mention of ‘things not invented’ here is also a good point but I for one do not have this close-mindedness and welcome all additions to our knowledge database which is TONMO.com. I am however, very wary of false claims and we do seem to get our share of them. We also get more than our fair share of ‘corner cutters’.

I am also very wary of the ‘this is how I do it and my way is the only way’ attitude sometimes seen here. It has caused more that a few online punch ups and certainly not to be encouraged.

I always urge people to do the very best they can for the animals in their husbandry, not the cheapest. Buy the biggest tank and best equipment you can for that particular species. Read everything you can on the subject, get practice at keeping other hardier marine animals first and build up experience.

As I said earlier; it’s still an infancy hobby. But this is a good thing, it means that there is still so much to do and discover. 2 years ago no-one would have thought that bandensis cuttles would be so (relatively) easy to find, keep and encourage to reproduce - what an achievement! In more years to come I bet that home bred octos will be as common. Roll on that day!

Cazz2020, thanks for bringing the thread up. It was very valuable and obviously something that needed to be addressed.

AXIMBIGFAN, I took out the name calling from post #18

Ditto to you Brock, you name caller!

Now please, if you want to respond here please do. All comments are welcome and the thread is not locked. I’ll keep an eye on it and tidy it up or split the thread into a new one later if need be

Best wishes to all
Colin

Thanks, Colin!

Thanks Colin, but I PM'ed him, and apologized for all that junk. No need to call me names for calling him names. ;)

Thanks Colin. It was getting a bit ugly.

Thanks, Colin, well said.

Nancy

Oooh, I missed a lot on this thread. Didn't know the eBay seller actually joined!

What Colin says here is quite cogent, I always defer to him and Nancy (and a few others here) for last word on ceph keeping.

Just for the record my only point in reporting the eBay product for sale was that I was nervous about the well-being of the octos in question... I'm all for forward advancement, so long as it's done responsibly and in a well-informed manner. Nothing against the seller; obviously the sale was proposed with the best of intentions.

Well said Colin-a quick question for you.
How bad did your fingers cramp up after all that?;)
I pm'd Dan an apology for all the flak. I hope he sticks around.
Being new here myself I do feel bad that his first experience here wasn't overly friendly.

wow, that was insightful. one has to be careful about being too quick to condemn. i really enjoyed this thread. i think the staff's comments were instructive and constructive.but sometimes you have to think outside the box. i've thoroughly enjoyed raising the 100 or so baby bimacs to their current 3 month old stage,and when you see their intelligence,it is amazing. sure you want the best and biggest for them-they're your kids. however,you do your best. With CARE. i didn't think i would be this successful . caging any animal might be deemed cruel. just think about a bird in a cage, or a fish in a tank- can you imagine what that is like?(i guess those of you who have been incarcerated ----) certainly stimulation is key. that is why as part of my studies i try to talk to my octopuses. o.k. not talk. but touch. i handle them, they definitely have temperaments. some seem to like this interaction. one in particular seems to crave it . i'm kinda falling for her- we're thinking of ruuning away and getting married.

not taking life too seriously, zyan ( god i hope she wants kids,lol)