o. briareus II ! even smaller then the last one total impulse purchase

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May 30, 2009
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What have I done?? I went to a local fish store to pick up a snowflake eel. I was in the process of converting my Ceph tank into a predator / NPS coral tank. However I saw they had an unknown octopus for $99 I couldn't see him and figured I wouldn't get it just look.

After breaking the little pvc so I could see what it was I was shocked to see a baby Briareus! See pictures. He has all 8 arms and has been in the store 1 week eating ghost shrimp. He fed him one shrimp and I talked him down to $80 + the critter keeper.

I'm acclimating him now and have to go out in 15 minutes, but I will try and get better pictures and video tonight.

To avoid a repeat of last time I will keep him in the critter keeper for a few weeks, depending on how comfortable he gets I will release him into the display or perhaps build a larger in tank cage for him.

Mantle is only what 3/4" maybe less. Arm to arm he's only about 6"

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:biggrin2:
I assume you are still planning on giving him a rock den. Don't be too surprised if he is not there in the morning though. Animal Mother tried to keep Kalypso in a critter keeper for the same reason and he did not stay long.
 
I just put a pvc elbow in with him for now. I probably will add a couple of pieces of live rock tomorrow. I also put a big piece of rock on the lid.

Can you believe how small he is? and all 8 arms. What condition! I basically had to buy him once I saw him even though another octopus was not on my mind at all. Actually last week another local reef shop tried to sell me a mimic who was also tiny. I knew enough to stay away from that, but I also know this guy will likely be another cool pet after several long months of growing up. When you actually think about it, I'm not sure it's that much better to get them this young since they just hide for months on end.

If he stays in the critter keeper for a few weeks I am hoping I can get him a little domesticated. I can start him on frozen food right away. I may or may not have some fiddlers kicking around, but if I do I think they'll be too big.
 
He looks somewhere between the two I just received. Very sadly the larger did not survive the first day and I have not seen the tiny one yet.

I have commented that I think about 5 months old is the best age for an aquarium because I don't think you can acclimate them to not hide before they reach a certain size/age/maturity(?). I have seen this with three species now. It could be as soon as 4 months and we need more sucess with eggs to pin it down and more people to record the observation and then count backwards when the wild caughts expire. You can almost know when the octopus reaches that stage of maturity (possibly sexual maturity is involved) because they will start to be seen and this may be a good way to get a decent guestimate on wild caught age.

I am not sure if the tiny one took out a fiddler or not. There was one in the tank I placed there because the crab was heavily laden with eggs and I had hoped the eggs or hatchlings would provide food if any of my new hatches had lived. None of the octos survived but the female fiddler did and I have not had a fiddler survive egg laying. I left her in the tank and she lived for several weeks but I can't be sure she was still alive when the new octo was introduced this week. The crab seems to be gone now though.
 
Surprisingly he is not in the pvc he is on top of the lid, he did try and get out but no luck so far.

I have got him eating PE mysis for now. That's how small he is. I got him to grab one or 2 last night and there were 3 or 4 others floating around which are now gone and presumed eaten. Since there is just the one elbow for hiding I don't think any bristleworms or other creatures got them.

I'll continue feeding him PE for a few days then move on to uncooked shrimp. If I can get him eating frozen food now I think it might help acclimating him. We'll see. It's really surprising to be waking up and checking on an octopus again. Just so random to have another one. Quite the pleasant surprise.
 
sorry to sound like a noobie. but if you went to your LFS and they had no information about this "unknown octopus". would you mind telling me how you were able to tell that it was o. briareus? what characteristics gave it away to be one species over another? i'm still new to this, and i'm trying to figure out how you guys id these guys so quick.
 
would you mind telling me how you were able to tell that it was o. briareus?
With braireus and many other species once you have kept one. IDing them in person can be pretty easy.

the traits for briareus are Long arms, green iridescent spots, and lots of webbing. And the young ones are blue around the eyes like this one.

and for the ones i have never kept i keep a copy of the cephalopod bible..Mark Normans "Cephalopods: A World Guide."
 
What Captfish said, once you've kept them it's easier to tell if they are the same. My previous guy was a youngling too but not this small.

I got him to take some PE Mysis off the tweezers again today. Also he grabbed my hand but is still very timid.

He's not too happy in the critter keeper but the stress he has in there is worth it as it's getting him comfortable with me. I added a second darker pvc that is more enclosed should he feel the need to hide in there.

First videos!






I took some photos, but once again have a busy day today. I will try and post them tonight. btw the video button doesn't appear to be working.
 
For videos, use the url in the address bar but paste it to the entry panel that pops up when you click on the little film icon. VBulletin does not accept the share or embed code directly but does its own embedding from the URL.

Be sure to post when he starts taking table shrimp. IME they need to be much older before they will accept it. My gut feel is that table shrimp is too tough for them at this age.
 
What do you suggest feeding then? Mysis is okay for now, I grab a clump with tweezers then carefully remove the tweezers from his grip.

At the store they were feeding him ghost shrimp which initially I thought was bad, but PE mysis is freshwater too and since this product came out it has been 90-100% of my marine fishes diet other then the ones that eat nori. So I'm not sure the whole freshwater food is bad for marine animals if its appropriate food. I don't know anything about their nutritional value but ghost shrimp and shore shrimp are both from the Palaemonetes genus and if they're gutloaded with marine pellets / cyclopeeze. I can't see the nutritional value being much different.
 
Well I may have to switch to live food..

Somehow the little guy managed to escape the critter keeper. I don't know how he did it. He was looking for flaws and finally found one.

It seems he has taken a den in the live rock where I can see him. Who knows if he will stay there. I'm actually shocked to find him in the main tank. He could have completely left and gone into my reef. I didn't have the octo proof lid on since I figured he was secure in the critter keeper.

Lid goes back on the tank but first I will try and get him to eat some more mysis.
 
So i got him to take some Mysis off the tweezers. He grabbed onto the tweezers and tried to take them from me, when he discovered they weren't the actual food he let go and threw a rock out of the hole.
 
Somehow the little guy managed to escape the critter keeper.
Surprise, surprise whatever happened to
:wink:

It is looking (without scientific backup, not that I have not tried) like FW crustaceans are close enough to SW to use at least in part for a proper diet. Their gusto over craw/crayfish suggests they may be a good choice and I have started including it in my diets when they are in season (I am freezing the tails only because of potential toxic contamination - at least for humans - but have fed whole live). I have not tried ghost shrimp but indications are that they are acceptable. Another food I know is well received but somewhat difficult to use is shelled hermit crabs. Live ones in the shell seem to be too difficult for them to extract but live or dead removed are quite readily taken.
 
Once again this morning he took PE Mysis off the tweezers. Strong grip for the little guy. He won't leave the den but several arms come out and if we can stick to this routine things should work out well.

Going to stick with PE for a little bit, again it's freshwater but sold as marine food and I've had great results using it as 90-95% of my marine fishes diet. They are super high in protein.

Next week I am going away just for a day but I'll probably be gone 36 hours. Hopefully this won't screw anything up.

As for the escape, I still don't see how he did it and if he didn't escape the keeper in the store I didn't think he would at home either. Of course I could have put mesh around it to ensure he could not get out but I figure if he wanted out that badly he can be in the open tank.
 

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