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Ocfemale.jpg
Neogonodactylus

Ocfemale.jpg

Occurring on the Pacific coast of Central America, Octopus chierchiae inhabits cavities and snail shells. This mature female is only the size of a grape. O. chierchiae has the distinction of being one of very few octopuses that don't die after hatching a single clutch of eggs. A female O. chierchiae in my lab laid 8 clutches over the course of two years
WOW! 2 years+ for a warm water dwarf species!
We kept the female on short rations between clutches and mated her only a few times. This seems to really show down the reproductive cycle. When we feed high quality food (crabs) ad lib females live about a year. I think this partially explains the iteroparity. They live in an environment where prey access is highly variable. When prey are rare, they can shut down, but if they get a few good meals they can quickly cranck out a small clutch.

Roy
 
When you mated the female what criteria did you use to choose the male? Individuals who had been successful in the past?

How long is the average time period between the mating and when the female lays eggs?

I worked with chierchiae a bit at MBL in the past so I was just curious what you have been seeing recently.
 

Media information

Category
Octopus Care
Added by
Neogonodactylus
Date added
View count
1,315
Comment count
4
Rating
5.00 star(s) 1 ratings

Image metadata

Device
NIKON CORPORATION NIKON D300S
Aperture
ƒ/32
Focal length
105.0 mm
Exposure time
1/60 second(s)
ISO
200
Filename
Ocfemale.jpg
File size
2.3 MB
Date taken
Fri, 06 January 2012 11:35 AM
Dimensions
4288px x 2848px

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