New Cuttlefish Journal

[TQN]

Good news and bad news...

During the week since my last update, all the cuttles seemed to be doing well. All were eating, and I have made sure the babies always have food available to them.
I noticed that although all babies were eating well, some were growing very fast, while others were still not much larger than hatchling size. But since all were eating and acting normal, I did not worry much about it. I have continued to keep them separated by size, to make sure the big guys did not out-compete the little ones for food.
Then, within the last two days, the two smallest cuttles have died suddenly for unknown reasons. So there are three left now.
It is frustrating to loose so many cuttles without knowing why. I don't know what would cause some babies to eat and grow, and others to eat just as well and as much, and just simply "fail to thrive". Of course the odds are that a few babies are genetically weaker than the rest, and may just be unfit to live, but this seems like such a high mortality rate.
Has anyone else noticed anything similar, or have found there are any differences in survival rate between captive bred and wild-caught eggs?

On a brighter note, the big guy took down his first shore shrimp last night! Now that he is larger than even the biggest shore shrimp, I guess he is finally confident enough to start hunting them. He could not finish the whole thing, but at least it is a good start.
And then tonight he took his first frozen PE mysis, and munched on it until the remaining shore shrimp wrestled it away from him. But at least one of them finally took frozen...that is a major milestone

 

[TQN]

Looks like at least one other keeper has had very similar results as far as survival rate...I know it sounds terrible, but although I am sad to hear of the losses, hearing that someone else is in the same boat makes me feel less like a cuttle murderer
Makes me wonder if Paradox/Thales have had similar results with other babies from the same batch? It would be very interesting to hear from them on the subject...(hint, hint...)

 

[Thales]

I think we have posted before that this kind of thing happens, and its frustrating. Sometimes a batch is great, sometimes it isn't, and the reasons could be anything. Sorry for the short post - long day.

 

[TQN]

Here are a few pics from last night, showing the scuffle between the largest cuttle and a shore shrimp, over PE mysis. The cuttle grabbed the mysid first (this being his first non-live prey ever). Then the shore shrimp grabbed ahold of the other end, starting a tug-of-war over the meal. Sadly, the shrimp pulled the food away from the cuttle, and the cuttle would not accept another frozen mysid when I tried to feed him again. He just hovered near the shore shrimp, watching it eat.
After a while I gave up and went to bed, and in the morning there was nothing left but the severed head of the shore shrimp. So in the end, the cuttle got its revenge.

 

[TQN]

Thales, thanks for your post. It makes me feel less disheartened to hear that it may just be a problem with this batch of babies, and that it may not be anything to do with my care. I want so much to succeed with these guys, as I have waited so long to get cuttles in the first place, and I have gone to great lengths to try to make things perfect for them, and to keep them healthy and happy. So I will hang in there, and hope that the remaining 3 will make it to maturity and hopefully produce more little cuttles

 

[TQN]

Almost another week later, the three babies are all still doing well. They are nearly 7 weeks old now. The largest is just over 1", with another at 3/4", and the smallest still at 1/2" or so. The little guy still prefers amphipods, but the other two are eating several live shore shrimps daily. I have gotten the babies to strike at thawed PE mysis a couple times, but so far it has not been a big hit with them. I think my main problem is that I keep them too well fed, so they don't have much motivation to try the non-living food. But that is ok--I have several hundred live shore shrimp at this point, so it is not like I am going to run out of live food anytime soon. Plus, it is much more entertaining to watch them hunt the live shrimp.

 

[TQN]

a few new pics--

 

[sedna]

Beautiful shots, TQN! I'm glad these guys are still doing well for you. I've found it helpful to keep more than one thing going, so at least there is success somewhere... If not I'm too busy to feel bad about it!

 

[TQN]

As of now, I have just the one largest cuttle left out of this batch, but he is doing great. He (I call it a "he", but it is still too young to sex) is at least 1.5" now, and eating 3-5 live shore shrimp every day. I keep trying PE mysis on a daily basis. He seems interested at first, but when he gets close enough to see it is not alive, he kicks it away in disgust
One thing I have noticed is that he appears to use the PE mysis as "bait" for the shore shrimp--he lurks in the macroalgae nearby, and when the shore shrimp come up to eat the mysis, he snags them.
Also, I have been trying to get him to associate me with food before I try to release him into the main tank. Every time I feed him, I tap on the tank in front of him to signal "feeding time". I have noticed that he is definitely responding to this. And when he sees me near the tank when it is not feeding time, he usually creeps up to the front of the tank to see what I am doing. This morning I was watching the younger batch of babies, which are in the container next to his. He has sand on the bottom of his container, but I kept the bottom of the hatchlings' container bare. I like to sit on the floor beside the tank and watch the new babies from beneath so as not to disturb them. I noticed the big guy trying to peer down at me, but he could not see me very well from where his container is located. Then he suddenly jetted at the sand and cleared off a little "window" in the floor of his container, so he was able to watch me from above! It is very interesting seeing how responsive and interactive he is getting as he gets bigger
Here are some funny "begging" pics from the other day--

 

[TQN]

BIG update!

ok, time for a much needed update on the cuttles!
Of the original batch from Paradox, the largest one is still alive and doing great. About a week ago I finally got it onto frozen shrimp. It loved live shore shrimp, but would never take PE mysis or frozen krill. I tried frozen shore shrimp, and it would take them right away, but still refused to take any krill. So with every order I would freeze any DOA shore shrimp and save them for later. But the only problem was that I still had to order shore shrimp on a regular basis, which was getting more and more expensive as the cuttle grew.
I checked every seafood market locally, and could not find any clear or white shrimp that were small enough. Then the other day I stopped by an Asian market, and in their frozen food section there was a package of "tiny shrimp" which were just about the size of shore shrimp! It was $2.95 for a large package of them, and the cuttle likes them so problem solved....

 

[TQN]

BIG update continued...

I have a bunch of other cuttle news, and I have decided to just add it to this thread, so I don't have a bunch of separate threads to keep track of. So all further cuttle adventures will be here...

On 2/26, I got a call from my favorite LFS that they had gotten a cuttle in! It was an adult, but looked to be in great shape. I decided to take my chances with it. I got it still in the original bag from shipping, and brought it home to acclimate.
Here are a few pics of it during acclimation--

 

[TQN]

So everything went smoothly during acclimation, and the big cuttle settled right in

 

[TQN]

On 3/10, I got another call from the LFS saying they had gotten in more cuttles! I picked them both up, right out of the shipping box, and brought them home to acclimate.
The smaller of the two new cuttles seemed to be doing much better than the larger one. I had them in separate containers for acclimation. Then the larger one inked profusely, and the entire bucket went opaque black. So I scooped it up and put it in the bucket with the other cuttle. Immediately the smaller one went into "zebra" display mode, and they almost instantly started mating. Unfortunately the condition of the larger female kept going downhill, and she did not make it
The male was doing just fine, so I decided to introduce him into the tank with my existing adult cuttle.

(Ok, this is getting confusing. From here on out, the captive-raised cuttle will be called #1, the first WC adult is #2, and the new male is #3.)

 

[TQN]

So I introduced #2 and #3, the two adult cuttles. I was watching closely in case of any fighting. I knew that #3 was male, but still did not know the sex of #2. I hoped that by watching the two interact, I would soon figure out whether they were a pair or not (of course hoping for a pair)
Well, unfortunately their behavior did not show anything conclusive. Both kept their neutral colors--no zebra displays, fighting, or breeding. They hovered near each other and continued to follow each other around the tank. Over the next two weeks, #3 was always hovering near #2. It almost seemed protective of the other cuttle. But still no fighting or breeding. I was still hoping that #2 would turn out to be female.
A couple times I saw #2 flash zebra colors briefly when it was irritated, and #3 would occasionally go into zebra display, but they never displayed at the same time. So still nothing concrete to determine the gender of #2. Because of lack of breeding, I was afraid that #2 was going to turn out to be male, but I was glad the two were co-existing peacefully anyway.

 

[TQN]

On 3/24 I was at work when I got a frantic phone call from home, that #1 had somehow escaped from its floating container into the main tank, the tank was black with ink and #3 was floating at the surface, dead. #1 and #2 were both unaccounted for. Unfortunately I could not get away and had to finish out my shift
I finally got home, and was able to clean up the tank. I found #1 and put it back in its container, and it seemed fine. #2 was fine as well. I could not see any obvious cause of death for #3, but my theory was that the two larger cuttles had both been male, and #1 must have been female. The two males had gotten along fine until #1 was free in the tank, then they fought to the death over the little female