Caligula: My First Octopus - O. Briareus

[DWhatley]

If you look into the cave where Caligula was excavating you will probably see that she has removed the sand all the way to the glass bottom. I have a similar video on KaySoh's thread. She has moved all the sand behind the LR and I removed some of it from the tank because it became quite high in the front. This may be a prebrooding preparation as 2 weeks later she stopped eating.

 

[Hayek]

I have seen the sort of behavior you are talking about, and Caligula prefers his multiple dens to have a glass bottom, but this was not a den building activity. I gave him a large shrimp which might not have been entirely thawed. He took it back to his den for five or ten minutes then came roaring up the glass with the shrimp. He flung the shrimp towards me. Then, he sat in front of his den, turned a bright red color, and shot sand at me. At one point, he crawled half way up the glass with sand before flinging it straight towards the glass (towards me). His behavior was a manifestation of anger / frustration with the food.

We are having feeding troubles.


Edit: Hmmm... the behavior does look quite a bit like that video. Maybe the large shrimp messed up his den and he was cleaning it out. I often see him moving sand around. I don't know.. I've watched him for many many many hours, and he definitely seemed perturbed.

 

[DWhatley]

The thoughts are not mutually exclusive and sequence of certain behaviors may have different meanings.

I noticed you are using He and that I suggested there might be a hint earlier but watching the videos, I can't tell if the third arm stays curled. At this age, it should be very obvious and I am inclined to think female.

 

[Hayek]

I posted a pic in another thread somewhere asking for help sexing Caligula. Then, those who posted thought he was a male. Here are the rest of the pictures. Maybe you will see something more definitive.

edit: Oh! I have seen him keep an arm curled, and I think it was the third, though, he does not do so at all times.

 

[CaptFish]

I'm inclined to say female. The pics of Male Briareus' that I have seen really seem to keep that third arm curled up tight.

 

[DWhatley]

I am going to stick with my second guess of female. There are sections of arms curled in the new photos but none are the 3rd arm to the right and none are as tightly curled as SueNami kept his arm (this may have been exagerated on his part though since his arm had been removed up to the webbing and is overly short). Here are a series of photos I posted to help identify a male (there are two of the same brieareus). SueNami kept that arm curled at all times but the mercatoris and hummelinckis would use theirs more normally.

 

[Hayek]

He has had his 3rd arm curled up tightly all night. I'm going to go with male.

 

[Hayek]

It has been quite some time since I've updated this journal, but Caligula is still alive and well. His arm span is currently 40" to 48".

We have gone through several different methods of feeding. At the time of my last post, I was using an aquarium claw to give him shrimp. He eventually became afraid of the claw (I think it pinched him) and would not take food from it. The next method I used was fishing line. I tied the end of the shrimp with fishing line then fished for my octopus. It made cleanup quite easy because when he was done, I could pull the remains of the shrimp out of the tank with the fishing line. Lately, I've just been dropping the shrimp into the tank. He smells it quickly and comes to get it. When he is finished, he brings the shrimp out to a spot in the front of the tank for removal.

I've experimented with several types of raw shrimp to Caligula's dismay, and he will only accept a certain size of a certain brand of shrimp (the name escapes me at the moment). He hasn't eaten live food for more than 3 months now.

 

[Hayek]

pic

pic taken with my phone! He seemed to enjoy posing for the camera this morning.

 

[DWhatley]

She is a pretty thing. I wish Kooah would come out in the light. She will play for quite awhile if my hands are outside the tank or she does not touch me with an arm tip (mantle touch is fine and sometimes she will let me pet her but the second she touches me with an arm tip she disappears at an incredible speed and often inks). She will come to the red lighted side if I sit there (the tank is split and I only have night lighting on one side) and her eyes are wide open so I know the red light does not bother her but she won't come out in the daylight.

Do you have actinics on the tank? Jean has mentioned an octo that didn't like the blue lighting and I am wondering if this one has a similar issue.

 

[Hayek]

dwhatley

She is a pretty thing. I wish Kooah would come out in the light. She will play for quite awhile if my hands are outside the tank or she does not touch me with an arm tip (mantle touch is fine and sometimes she will let me pet her but the second she touches me with an arm tip she disappears at an incredible speed and often inks). She will come to the red lighted side if I sit there (the tank is split and I only have night lighting on one side) and her eyes are wide open so I know the red light does not bother her but she won't come out in the daylight.

Do you have actinics on the tank? Jean has mentioned an octo that didn't like the blue lighting and I am wondering if this one has a similar issue.

Caligula will not let me touch his mantle, but he will occasionally reach out with a tentacle and touch my fingers. Like Kooah, he often pulls back a bit frightened, but as of yet Caligula has not inked. Caligula has typically been most active when all of the tank lights and room lights are off between 3:00am and 7:00am. I use a head mounted red unobtrusive light for viewing.

You may be right about the aversion to actinics as the 50/50 T8 bulb causes him to wince when it comes on. I have speculated that since the lights were set to come on before it was sufficiently light in the room, it didn't give his eyes a chance to adjust. I now turn the 18" daylight t8 bulb on first at about 9:00am and wait until 11:00am or 12:00am to turn on the 50/50 bulb. This approach has been successful to some degree.

I will be posting many more pictures and videos at some point from my camera. Those attached were taken with my phone and are not of the best quality. Notice that one of the tentacles is curled in two of the pictures.

 

[DWhatley]

I you get a really good shot of the curled arm, be sure and remind me as I am always looking for good examples to add to my sexing thread.

CaptFish, do you use actinics in Legs tank?

 

[CaptFish]

I use 50/50 power compacts. on legs tank I have two 48" 130 watt Coralife Aqualight units.

Search results for: '' - Bulk Reef Supply

On the Merc tank i just have a regular single 24" Marine Fluorescent that came with the tanks hood, Aqueon I think.

 

[Hayek]

D, I'm sure I have a good picture of it somewhere. I've been taking quite a few photos. I'll see what I can find.

 

[Hayek]

Fishing for octopus