• Looking to buy a cephalopod? Check out Tomh's Cephs Forum, and this post in particular shares important info about our policies as it relates to responsible ceph-keeping.

Baby cuttlefish, probably bandensis. Questions...

Just wanted to post a quick update, as today my cuttlefish is a month and 2 days old. Here's a photo I took earlier:

DSC00709.jpg



Should be getting another lot of mysis in this week. I attempted to feed him frozen mysis twice at this point, I am not exactly sure what to think of the results -- on the second mysis feeding, I thought I saw him grab one out of the current, but he just seemed to have dashed into it as opposed to using his "stretchy" "hunting" tentacles (for lack of better wording..). Do cuttles only hunt using those? Or could I have possibly witnessed it grab some frozen mysis then?

Anyway.. I believe his primary food source, other than the mysis I've been buying for him are these guys:
DSC00698.jpg


Theyre about 1/4inch long and all over the place. You literally cant stare at any point in the tank for more than a few seconds without seeing at least 3-4 of them scuttling around. As you can see I let some algae stay on the glass cause the 'pods seem to like it & makes them sitting ducks for the cuttlefish. . . . or at least I think so... haha

DSC00686.jpg

Took this photo a couple of days ago. I was worried he was getting sucked into the filter (he was perfectly fine, im just paranoid, heh). It still amazes me how well he can maneuver in the current despite his small size.

DSC00687.jpg

One last photo, I love how he changes color/shape!!
 
I would say you are ready for shore shrimp.... I just dumped mine in the tank with the cuttles and let them free feed... Once they got to shore shrimp they grew very quickly!
 
What kinda setup you have him in by the way? from the pictures is looks interesting. Also, if you get shore shrimp i would suggest getting 100... That should last him several months and I would think you could slowly ween him onto large frozen shrimp as they run out.
 
I currently keep him in a 30 gal biocube (29gal?) I put "stuff" on the filter intake because I was afraid he'd get sucked in after he hatched.

I am a little concerned as to wether or not he's big enough for shore shrimp.. I would say he is between 3/4-1 inch in length. I am going to try buying some small feeder shrimp at my lfs and see what happens over the weekend, then order either mysis or shore shrimp on monday...
 
Don't under estimate their small size. Cuttlefish can capture and kill prey larger than themselves. Generally you want to give them something no larger then their mantle, but a little larger or smaller wouldn't hurt as long as its not an agressive prey animal. You can also trick them into eating whole unpeeled frozen shrimp. I had my S, Pharoanis eating frozen prawns larger than themselves by making it "dance" in front ofthe with a clear acrylic rod.
 
well, Ill definitely pick up some feeders from the lfs. I have read it is ok to feed freshwater feeder shrimp from a "good, trusted" source. Any input on this?

I am definitely keeping his diet as marine as possible, just I can't get shore shrimp or mysis in till tuesday or wednesday.
 
FW ghost shrimp and SW shore shrimp are basically the same thing. They look almost identical and the main difference would be whether they were wild caught or aquacultured and what they were fed. I will say that I am mostly switching to ghost shrimp because of the cost.... At 20 cents a piece they are much cheaper than shore shrimp... Especially after shipping.

I guarentee if you put ghost shrimp ranging in size from 1/2 inch to inch and a half they will all go missing within a week and your cuttle will double in size(maybe not length but deffinetly girth).
 
Ghost shrimp ( Palaemonetes kadakensis or Palaemonetes paludosusare) are freshwater animals where shore shrimp (usually Palaemonetes vulgaris) are saltwater shrimp. Current thinking is that all freshwater animals do not contain the best fat types and ratios for saltwater feeders (and visa versa). The fatty content is an issue of biologics and not feeding (which is another consideration). I have tried (with little participation) to start a thread discussion to try to establish if this is true of shrimp and crayfish and cannot find comparitives on-line that would clearly answer if these animals are exceptions. It would be nice to find out that there is little difference where it matters but those claiming this to be true have no backing of their statements.
 
I dont know... I've read the difference in shrimp that are aquacultured versus wild caught is what they are fed. If a common white shrimp is fed corn meal it will obviously have different fatty acid profiles than that of a white shrimp that eats algae and detritus in the ocean. I seriously doubt whether it is a function of whether they are kept in salt versus fresh water.

Another example: If you go look at the fatty acid profiles(not to mention crude protein and fat contents) of the various frozen mysid shrimp that can be found on the market you will see a huge difference between brands. These are the same species and are probably kept in similar conditions(I have looked into culturing them and have found that brackish conditions offer the best conditions for breeding), so what accounts for the difference? I would bet that it is what they are fed.

Further:

Eric Lund, researcher from Universirty of Wisconsin, Madison, explains, "Briefly, saltwater fish all require a fatty acid that is common in marine fish oils called DHA (docosahexanoic acid) in their diet. They cannot make it from precursors, so it must be present in their food. Freshwater fish have a limited ability to make DHA from a particular precursor fatty acid of the omega-3 variety (linolenic acid), but they too can grow and reproduce well on a diet that includes DHA."

Taken from: http://chika.aka.org/library/bbssupp/supplemt.htm

This article is about Artemia but that statement applies to all saltwater verts and inverts. I guess I'm saying that fatty acid profiles and crude protein/fat content are much more dependent on diet that whether they are fresh or salt water. At the very least you can just gut load the ghost shrimp with PE mysis or the like and get good results.
 
I don't believe that any shrimp used for food in the hobby are cultured. The different brands of mysis are wild caught, and I don't believe any of the live shrimp that we feed cephs are cultured - but they are kept in outdoor ponds. When I last looked into it the different protein profiles for the different frozen mysis were due to differences in species.
FWIW, I have raised entire generations of S. bandensis on FW ghost shrimp.
 
Thanks for all the advice!!
This weekend marks my cuttle's fifth week of life, he's become increasingly active, I see him come out every night at around 7 or 8 to go hunting and now he swims about the tank rather than hang in the back like usual. I am picking up some ghost shrimp for him asap now that I know they're ok to feed.
 
Progress report!!

This weekend I was finally able to buy some ghost shrimp for my cuttle, go figure, when I finally want to get some all the LFS's in town were out. I finally got to buying ghost shrimp which he gobbled up the same day!

He keeps growing like crazy, I cant believe how big its got. I just hope that he stops being so freaking shy, but at least he hasn't inked (yet).

I'm thinkin of feeding it maybe 3-4 shrimp a day for the time being, does that sound ok?
 
My small Cuttles (3/4 inch) are eating 1 small (3/4 inch) ghost shrimp a day. The big ones (2+ inchs) are eating 2 big (1+ inch ghost shrimp) a day....

Bit confusing... but I hope that helps.

Pics are also Great :wink:
 

Shop Amazon

Shop Amazon
Shop Amazon; support TONMO!
Shop Amazon
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Back
Top