[Octopus]: Margay - O. Burryi

Yep! That's the one thing that drove me nuts at first.... the empty tank. We have kind of solved that problem, at least for the kids. They just love the shore shrimp I put in the tank! They are amazed that you can see the food inside them after they eat!:smile:
 
Jack, I have a special relationship with a fish collector in the Keys (I am their webmaster) so most of my animals come from them. Some are found while collecting and others show up in their live rock after a collection run at their rock farm. If KPAquatics has one available that I cannot keep AND they don't have a taker from their waiting list, I usually post to the availability thread with a photo.

When I know the source of a new journaled animal, I include it in the List of Our Octopuses sticky at the top of the journals forum. This year I am trying to include links to the various suppliers.
 
Great family, I actually started the site for Kara's father, Ken and do some administrative and web work for his AdoptACoral program. Hopefully I will have a new site up for them in the coming month but adding all the behind the scenes features and converting their data has been a slow process. If you dive, you might want to look into doing a nursery maintenance class and dive (shameless promo). I was going to ask, "Where's its journal" but I did a quick check and saw you have an ID question out so I will go there now :sagrin:
 
Waiting to be fed

Tonight's feeding was interesting. Both Margay and Onn (both acclimated the same day. Different species of young octopuses, Onn being the youngest) were waiting to be fed tonight. After the first two weeks both have been reclusive. Margay moved to the back of his tank and would reach up for food but needed encouragement most nights. Onn has been very difficult to feed and we have relied mostly on her eating live food. Tonight they were not only waiting for supper (no difference in timing) but came after the food with gusto.

I have made comments about how long it takes before the animals are acclimated to living in an aquarium and have guestimated the time to be about 1 month. There is a new sticky poll at the top of the Octopus Care forum to try to capture timing for this event in an attempt to gain timing similarities. I am hoping keepers will record their initial observation and then post a "vote" when they see the behavior is consistent. I won't post this for Margay or Onn yet as the qualification is they have to continue to show this expectation for one week.
 
Thanks I think thats a great idea. I love that your trying to put together as much info as you can for the next gen of octo keepers. I have been involved with lots of aquarium sites but none of them are as information based as this one. They all seem to be like look at my new tank, look how much coral I have. I believe there is a real love for octos here and this site is always trying to learn more to keep our octos happy and healthy.
 
Yep, I agree! I can hardly believe all the things I have learned here! The interaction with other people is great too! I have been wondering why DaVinci seems to be less shy than Ziggy was. I realize species has a lot to do with it, but the young man I talked to before buying DaVinci said that he'd been there about 3 weeks. Am guessing that he probably got kind of used to people during that time. I wish I had 2 octopus tanks right now! Hummmm..... interesting idea!!! :heee:

FYI... am still excited about tonmocon!!! :biggrin2:
 
Pictures, finally. Margay has simply not been seen except at supper and even then has only exposed himself (still no indication of sex) long enough to grab his shrimp. The last two or three nights he has "almost" come out but inked last night when I moved while he was thinking about it. Today, however, I found him at the Koralia around 1:00. Earlier I had seen signs of sucker shed. I also noticed that the Koralia had been disrupted last week so I was not too surprised to find him embracing it and moving his suckers along the intake (I have had several octos use them to help shed suckers). What I did find exciting is that he stayed out for over two hours and I managed a few pictures. Unfortunately, at that time of day there is a strong glare on the tank. Wearing dark clothes and trying to block some of the reflection has been my best option but the results are not great.


 

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I wonder if he has eaten most of the cope/amphi pods in the tank now as he was actively stalking the peppermint shrimp. The shrimp in that tank has lived through one and maybe two other octos but I suspect he will not ultimately escape Margay. I tried videoing the stalking but he was very, very slow in his approach. Both times I stopped the video, he decided to pounce. Between my poor timing and the reflections, the videos are not worth posting but here are two more looks I did manage to capture (threw out a lot of pictures this time :roll:)


Today was the first time I have the the leopard look that resulted in his name but I was not able to capture it.

One observation I made with LittleBit and one hummelincki (I think it was Octane) is the ability to change the eye covering (I believe this serves as an iris) to red. This seems to signal an aggressive mode or displeasure. Margay has been displaying the red color since he moved to the back but after sitting with him for awhile, he stopped the display.
 

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Almost 2 weeks to the day from when Margay first (after full acclimation) showed up waiting for supper, we are FINALLY starting to see him regularly. He has eaten well (no coaxing) ever since but has not been waiting for us in the open. Since Friday, however, we have seen him out during the day (differing hours). He definitely watches us and pays attention to our motion and will sometimes reach out to the glass to explore fingers that are on the outside. Any attempt to open the top or put a hand in (including one with food) chases him off to his den. Tonight he was out for at least an hour and later came back out after he saw me looking for him in the tank (a first). I offered a snack of crawfish claw but he had very little interest. Eventually, he decided to accept it from a stick and tucked it away but did not concentrate on eating it. Instead he just watched me without coming over to the front of the tank.

Something I have not seen before and have now see twice with Margay is the use of two arms (not sure if it was L1 and R1 or R1 and R2) almost like tentacles. At least while young (just seen on a Hanlon in situ video posted here) O. vulgaris appears to hunt a lot in the sand and we have seen Margay dig holes with a section of arm (not the tip) as he hunts. However, this was more of a two arm capture attempt with the arms starting spread and then brought together. He did not display webbing and it was not clear what he was trying to catch but I have seen the motion very distinctly on two occasions now. I will work on capturing a video :biggrin2:
 
Octos and kids! Just after I decide to post that Margay is coming out everyday and interacting a little ... Today, no sign of him all day. He stayed in his den and did not come out in advance (but did eat) his dinner. :roll:
 
Margay likes to make a lier out of me. In any case what I THOUGHT was Margay may have been a rock, at least part of the time. He is coming out again slightly less often but fully in the open. He may have actually been in another den and watching rather than being fully recluse. We have several threads where keepers have jokingly considered posting only negative behavior just so the octopus will behave in an opposite manner.
 
Margay is female

Margay has again become social after her short return to being a recluse :biggrin2:. Yesterday she played with my hand on the glass for an extended period and I was able to get a good look at her third right arm. She carries all but the arm tip she is reaching toward me curled while exploring the glass so I needed a good long daylight look to see if the curled tip was smooth (specialized tip called a ligula) or contained suckers. From my title, you can see that the third arm to the right showed suckers down to the very tip.

I did bring out the camera after we interacted a bit but she wanted nothing to do with the newly introduced monster and unhurriedly sauntered to her new den before I could even take the first shot.
 
The camera thing seems to be common. Tranny does the same thing. We will play tag and then he sees the camera and takes off for his den or some rocks. They are not very photojenic LOL.. Glad to see Margay is coming out. It is kind of frustrating when they come out one day and you repeat the same things for the next few days and nothing. Then they are back out like look at me here I am come play. LOL
 

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