I found a cluster of eggs under a rock while I was SCUBA diving. I live in South Florida and am currently a PHD canidate, for Invertabrate Zoology. While doing research for school I found this cluster of eggs under a rock and decieded to collect a few. There was probabley 300 or more eggs and I took about 100. This was a month ago and today the first little guy hatched. The Scientist in me divided them up into three seperate tanks one at 74 degrees one at 78 and one at 82. As projected the development of the eggs in the warmer water is faster. I think I have Identified them as Briareus but I am not sure being that they are 5mm long. This is just my guess based on the size of the eggs and the location I found them. Any tips on what to feed them What they are, and how to care for them is greatly appreciated.

It's great that you have the resources to do an experiment with different temperatures! So in keeping with the theory of longevity in octos, the warmer temp. octopuses should grow faster and the colder temp. ones should live longer. I'm curious to see how this turns out....

I did a dive trip where some researchers (Mark Norman and Julian Finn) set out light traps at night. They caught huge amounts of juvenile octopus, and even they had no idea what they. Suffice to say, ID would be extremely difficult of your lot. Females are usually with their eggs...you obviously didn't see one. Be careful though, it may be a blue ringed species, and I believe their young produce the venom pretty early on, although their beaks would have a hard time piercing skin.

As far as food goes, I have no idea, but if it were me, I would try and get my hands on some live mysid, and raise brine shrimp. I'm not sure how they would go with frozen stuff, but as many of you have success with dead foods with adults, it would be worth a try.

The higher temp the shorter the gestation period is pretty consistent with most marine life.

I did a dive trip where some researchers (Mark Norman and Julian Finn) set out light traps at night. They caught huge amounts of juvenile octopus, and even they had no idea what they. Suffice to say, ID would be extremely difficult of your lot. Females are usually with their eggs...you obviously didn't see one. Be careful though, it may be a blue ringed species, and I believe their young produce the venom pretty early on, although their beaks would have a hard time piercing skin.

The only way it could be a blue-ring in Florida would be if someone let a pet blue-ring go in the ocean... they're natively found near Australia and Indonesia, and a bit further afield, but that far...

Err oh yeah, oops. Sorry I'm a bit Australia centric, forgot they aren't everywhere :)

I'd go with mysids and amphipods. Brine shrimp have next to no nutritional value, unless newly hatched or gut loaded, and frankly it's not worth the bother!

J

Best of luck with the babies...Being you live so close to the water, why not try to collect lots of tiny things and just put them in your tank? Go at night with flashlight and a very tiny meshed net and capture what flocks to the light. I know by me you can go look under rocks at low tide and there's tons of tiny hatchling crabs plus a load of shrimp.

Do you have any pics of the eggs or babys?

If you have access to a plankton net, you could do a couple of trawls from the shoreline or off a pier, you would get lots of yummy creatures for them to eat.

This is best I can do for pictures right now when one dies I will throw it under the microscope and take a few pictures they almost look like baby sepioidea "baby reef Squid" Thanks for the tip tomorrow I am going out to the ocean and I plan on using a fine mesh net to capture something, in addition to the amphipods I am getting from a friend. How long after hatching could I expect them to eat? What other cephalopod could they be? Is any type of squid a possibility?

They can start eating immediately!

J

jean, what school are u studying at? maybe i could come see the babies?

oops, not jean :P, skydivemcbain, i meant

The babies are at my house in Fort Lauderdale. Unfortunatley they are slowly dying I am pretty sure they are squid babies. I study at Florida Atlantic University. The babies won't eat. Not mysids or amphipods, or what I collected for them at the ocean. They hatch... Swim around for a day... lay down and die. :(:confused: