Sedona - O.mycropyrus

[Joe-Ceph]

The arms look too long, and/or I don't see as much webbing as I would expect. If this is a pacific coast native, and a dwarf species, I think there's only one possibility, and it's a long shot: O. micropyrsus (California Lilliput Octopus). A big one has a mantle length of an inch, and they are nocturnal. They live in the hold-fasts of giant kelp, or sometimes in little shells. I don't know how in the world they would get one. Maybe they have a bounty on them and some enterprising ten year old in Mexico spends all day picking through the kelp hold-fasts that wash up on shore after a storm. this is the right time of year for that, with storms.

I wonder if an emaciated baby bimac would look and act like that? In either case, I'd try to stock the tank with lots of easy prey in the right size. I'm finding that my baby bimac isn't fast enough to catch tiny shrimp, and seems reluctant to tackle large hermit crabs, preferring to jump on small ones (and only after I remove their shells (with a hammer)). You chill the tank right? If so, I would guess that a warm water octopus would have died from the cold by now. Did you ever see eye spots on it? I don't think O. micropyrsus has eye spots, but there's so little on the internet about them that I don't really know.
I wonder if it would help to keep a few de-shelled small hermit crabs, or other live food, in a jar, submerged in the tank, that has an opening that the octopus can get through, but that the hermits can not get out of? Hermits mostly crawl instead of swim, so a 2" long piece of 1/2" pvc pipe, shoved through a roughly cut hole in the plastic lid of a clear jar, would probably work. I'm thinking that the big tank is just too large a hunting ground for a tiny octopus, unless you put 200 naked hermit crabs in there too, so maybe a feeding station, that's always in the same place, would allow Sedona to consistently get food, and allow you to know whether or not she is eating.

 

[SabrinaR]

Well I have been putting small fiddlers and pods in the tank for about a month or so and she seems to be doing ok. I have more pods coming tomorrow so if those make her happy then more power to her. I am not really sure what other foods I should keep for her to be honest. How does one ger a hermit out of its shell with out killing it?

I will be buying a barnical sometime today so heres hoping that will both make her happy and keep her visable. A red light is in my future too.

 

[Joe-Ceph]

I thought that there was some doubt that she was eating. Is her mantle longer than 1"? if so, she's not O. micropyrsus, and would most likely be a bimac, but a very slender (starving?) one. My suggestion about making a feeding station was a response to this possibility. If she's a bimac, judging from the picture, and the fact that she hasn't grown, she's starving, and will die within weeks, unless food becomes more available to her than it has been so far.

I've found that on a concrete slab, I can crack the shells used by the small local hermit crabs I collect, with a small hammer, without injuring the crab (at least 90% of the time). The hammer is a little claw hammer with a head about 2.75" wide and a 9" handle; a house framing hammer would probably make a gritty wet spot out of a little hermit crab. I think D cracks their shells with pliers, and someone else convinces them to leave their shells voluntarily (heat? cold? noisy neighbors? Adjustable mortgage?)

I read on another thread that red bulbs made for photo darkrooms, and red LEDs (not just white LEDs with a red lens) work well, but that some other "red" bulbs put out a lot of other light that octopus can see. You'll might also need to make sure that the room is really dark, to avoid being silhouetted.

 

[SabrinaR]

I hadn’t really considered that she was a sickly bimac to be honest... even after your first post it just didn’t strike me as a possibility but the thought makes me really sad. I have over 100 amphipods coming tomorrow and I think I will pull some of my dwarf blue hermits from my nano and try them as well. I will put them in a feeding location as you suggested.

I do not think her mantle is more than 1 inch to be honest but the thought that she isn’t a dwarf and I am starving her is nightmarish and I can not even fathom it, so I will do what I can.

 

[SabrinaR]

Ok so now I have 1 hermit (with out shell) in a plastic cup in the tank. He didnt much like loosing his shell but you have to do what you have to do.

We will see how it all goes tonight.

Thank you for the suggestion of the hammer. I have a meat tenderizer that I used... The pliers always seemed to smash the shell and the hermit so using them just didnt work for me.

I worry about putting many naked hermits into the tank at one time. I have fiddlers and other hermits in there now so its possible there will be lots of fighting over shells if I put to many with out protecting the naked ones.

 

[Joe-Ceph]

given that her mantle is less than one inch, that she acts nocturnal, and that she's probably from the pacific coast, I'll bet she's O. micropyrsus, and not a starving bimac, so don't worry, but just to be on the safe side, I think setting up a "feeding station" would be a good idea. When she was in the small cage, before you released her into the large tank, did you notice that she had the big eyes and the slender body proportions (as compared to a bimac) like she seemed to have in the picture? Did you notice any false eye spots? If she hasn't gotten more slender over time, she's almost certainly a dwarf, and probably O. micropyrsus, and not a skinny bimac. That would be really cool, because few, if any, people have kept them. I hope you keep a detailed journal of preferred foods, behavior, temperature, and other observations, so that you can post some info about how to keep this species (assuming that's what it turns out to be).

 

[SabrinaR]

The arms look too long, and/or I don't see as much webbing as I would expect. If this is a pacific coast native, and a dwarf species, I think there's only one possibility, and it's a long shot: O. micropyrsus (California Lilliput Octopus). A big one has a mantle length of an inch, and they are nocturnal.

She doesnt have much webbing if any that I could see. Now to tell you the truth I only saw her for a minute. So I cant be sure of anything. I didnt see any eyespots and trust me I was looking. I would think if there were eyespots they would have been glowing once she saw me. She is a clever little octopus and was careful not to move to fast so that I wouldnt see her lol.

I did find a claw arm yesterday... now that I am thinking about it I believe it was a hermit claw.

 

[SabrinaR]

When she was in the small cage, before you released her into the large tank, did you notice that she had the big eyes and the slender body proportions (as compared to a bimac) like she seemed to have in the picture? Did you notice any false eye spots? If she hasn't gotten more slender over time, she's almost certainly a dwarf, and probably O. micropyrsus, and not a skinny bimac. That would be really cool, because few, if any, people have kept them. I hope you keep a detailed journal of preferred foods, behavior, temperature, and other observations, so that you can post some info about how to keep this species (assuming that's what it turns out to be).

I believe she has always been this slender. Was never very large at all. I also dont believe I ever saw webbing but I will be checking the pictures that I have of her.

Here is a pic of her when I first got her...

You can tell from this pic that she does have the some what bug eyed look to her.

I keep her tank rather warm to be honest (70 degrees). I was hoping (based on what you said previously in journals) that the warmer temps would help her mature faster so that I would A. be able to see her and B. make sure she was being feed properly. Not to mention the shadiness of the company that I simply didnt know what kind of octo she was and like you said before... a warm water octo would die at the 65 or lower temps.

 

[SabrinaR]

I wish I took better pictures... I am pretty sure I am not getting one for Christmas so I will be hunting down ebay after the holiday.

 

[DWhatley]

I am going to make a guess that it is O. digueti. I remembered there was a Pacific dwarf that looked a lot like a merc but I could not remember the name. It just came to me so I looked it up in Norman's Cephalopods A World Guide and it is a pretty good match from what we can see (and is a common species). Searching for on-line pictures, I remembered why I had noted this one looking much like a merc

 

[Joe-Ceph]

D,
Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit! (I hope you don't mind my using a Southernism)
I bow to your superior knowledge of octopus. I hadn't heard of the Pacific Pygmy Octopus (O. Digueti), but it's certainly a more likely answer than O. micropyrsus as I suggested. From what I could Google, they live in the northern Sea of Cortez. I found a paper about them called Laboratory Growth, Reproduction and Life Span of the Pacific Pygmy Octopus, which you can read HERE.
apparently scientists like them because they are easy to raise (large egged, aggressive eaters) and grow quickly.

 

[SabrinaR]

Hmmm the link didnt work could you repost it please?

 

[Joe-Ceph]

I fixed the link in the original post. Sorry, my mistake.

 

[DWhatley]

Joe, I'm only half southern .

I remembered there was a common one that Greg (cthulhu77) thought about raising at one time (as I recall there is a bite incident recorded when he tried to take a photo of one - If you have not read this thread, you will find it entertaining but don't read Roy's airplane experience with a full bladder ) but the name escaped me until last night. There may be another (besides the rubescens that I am sure it is not) as well but I don't know many species and fewer of the Pacific (but have the Field Guide to Squids and Octopods of the Eastern North Pacific and Bering Sea on my Xmas list)

 

[SabrinaR]

I have been looking for other dwarf pacific octos as well and keep finding one called O. broki or bocki but I have no idea what it is. Anyone else have a clue?