[Octopus]: Seven + - Unidentified - Newbie with Octopus meant for sushi

Interesting and not a noobie mistake. Many shrimp can be aggressive but, with a healthy animal, the octo wins dinner. A noted exception is the mantis shrimp. An experiment @Neogonodactylus did with a blue ring several years ago resulted in an unexpected dinner for the shrimp and not the other way around. Size does matter in determining prey vs predator but, octopuses can usually take down shrimp close to their own size without difficulty. However, pistol shrimp have quite a punch (like the mantis) and may not be a good live food offering (not something we have other reports about). Roy?

It is likely that Seven is in senescence and weak. The skin is beginning to deteriorate, attracting the shrimp to dinner (or defense) and Seven can no longer defend or go on the attack. It is unusual that he is still eating and dead food offerings are likely best (if he eats at all).

Here is Roy's video from 2009. Note the size difference.
 
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Whoa. Poor little guy!

Seven is still eating, but is now down to about once a week. I still offer food daily, but he either ignores it or pushes the stick away.

Today marks our 8th week! :smile:
 
Seven looks like he's on his last breath :frown:

He was acting all erratic this morning, plastered on the glass, breathing hard with arms all over the place. Like something in between convulsing or twitching. Now he's lying on the sand (horizontally), with arms still all twitchy. There looks to be a piece of skin or arm that was shed or broken off.
 
It was a good 8 weeks, very informative, very educational.
I knew it was coming, but it still felt too sudden :frown:

Seven is 25cm long from mantle to the tip of his longest arm. And weighed 24.1grams at death.
 

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Thank you so much for sharing these experiences. I have looked for live octopuses in our Asian markets to try something similar without success. The only other attempts have been from @davelin315. I believe it may not be legal to sell them live in my state (GA) since we have the same chain and a consuming population. They do offer live crab, abalone (I have one of those in my nautilus - cold water - tank but it took 6 before one lived more than a couple of months), fish and geoduck (too large even for my 140 cold tank or I would have tried one). Your experiences were somewhat different than Dave's in that the animals were likely not shipped by air and not kept in almost freezing temperatures.
I am excited to see your interest in marine aquariums grow and won't be surprised to see a new journal :cephdevil: in the not too distant future.
 

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