• 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.

Cuttle Surprise

Are you using table shrimp with your "fishing" experiment? Something is fishy :tomato: if it floats as even the smallest pieces we feed our two fish sink (without fishing line). If anyone sews see if they have a spool of plastic thread. It is very thin should not float the shrimp (assumes the line is the problem). Another thought would be dental floss. My one concern is that the very thin might get eaten.
 
With my feeding device and the 80lb test fishing line, I can maneuver the shrimp anywhere in the tank I want, even through rock caves. I got the 80lb test at a local bait shop. I also have a Pet Club and PETCO near me that sell cheap freshwater feeder shrimp. The cuttles will eat these with gusto and are good alternative to use in a pinch.
 
I have been trying the tail end of raw "medium sized" shrimp from Kroger. After I read DW's post I tossed one in for a test without the fishing line and it sank very well... so seems like the line I was using is the cause of my floating issue. Will try the bamboo stick, and something like a sinking fly line.... hard to find 80lb test in Colorado :^)
 
Steve,
I TRY to remember to suggest new members edit their profile to display a location hint (city, state/province and country if not US is suggested but members use more creative identifiers as well :biggrin2:). This helps with some of the feeding questions (big difference if you live in coastal FL or Denver :biggrin2:) as well as to allow member a chance to share local resources and occasional min-TONMOcons
 
Just wanted to give a quick update on Little Guy. Although he has shown interest (and even tried one once) he just will not eat frozen shrimp. The one time he did grab one he spat it out after a second or two and had what I would call a little temper tantrum… was actually quite funny. He is like Gollum…. If its not raw and wriggly he thinks its nasty.

So I have given in and am doing a total live diet… so far I have tried guppies, cheap chromis, fresh/marine shrimp, and fiddler crabs.

Without a doubt if I were to pick one live food I would pick the fiddlers. Little Guy seems to enjoy the hunt (even if it does only take a minute) as well as being satisfied with only one or maybe two. He will easily eat 10-15 1” shrimp or 2 chromis/5 guppies in a sitting then be hungry the next morning but with the crabs he will eat 1 or 2 and then hide out for a good day.

Currently his diet consists of about 7 fiddler crabs a week along with a treat of a few guppies or a chromis on the weekend (he really likes the fish because they take up to 20 minutes to hunt).

When I count in shipping for the crabs total food cost has stabilized to about $15 per week. Less than I spend on Bagels for my team each week… plus I get far more enjoyment out of feeding Little Guy a crab than I do out of feeding an engineer a bagel.

One thing I do find interesting is that Little Guy and the long spine urchin seem to have a thing. If little guy is not on his rock he is with the Urchin… sometimes even within the spines. When he moves toward the urchin it will part its spins and let him in. Do cuttlefish and urchins have some kind of pseudo symbiotic relationship in the wild? I could not find any reference to such a thing on the Google machine.
 
Little Guy and the Urchin.

Not sure if this is normal but I find how much he is attached to the Urchin a little endearing.

 

Attachments

  • conv_301033.jpg
    conv_301033.jpg
    164.8 KB · Views: 114

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