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Urgent Which octopus to pick!!!

tkong

O. bimaculoides
Registered
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Nov 8, 2012
Messages
51
So i have a choice between a .5 inch mantle briaerus or vulgaris or a 1.5-2" inch mantle 7-8" arm length briaerus or vulgaris. Which one shud i get? Is the .5 inch mantle one too small??? Im afraid itll be a pain to baby octopus proof the overflow.
 
personaly if the species is known i would allways go for the smaller one just for the fact that you will have it longer but i also have about 9 different size tanks to choose from so this makes caring for smaller one a little easier on me.
your main concern shoud be based on what size tank you have, a briarus can be housed in a 65g tank but a vulgaris needs 150 or better.
 
:welcome: to TONMO!

Difficult choice if you have the tank capacity, a no brainer if not. Although both are listed as crepuscular (early evening and early morning active) vulgaris is more likely to be out earlier IME). Both are hardy species. The younger animal will stay hidden longer. Depending upon your overflow configuration, a sponge is usually the easiest to set up as a deterrent but either one may (will) investigate it (keep in mind they can squeeze through anything the size of their eyes. The eye is not the factor but the hard beak will be about that size).

Vulgaris is much stronger than briareus and if you have never kept an octopus, this might be a consideration. Both are relatively strong, can be aggressive during interaction as adults, can disrupt a tank and need weighted or locked tops but only vulgaris has left sucker marks on my arm when playing. IMO, vulgaris shows more intelligence (which is not necessarily a good thing when trying to keep it safe) but O. briareus is arguably the most attractive.
 
okay guys thanks for the advice but the decision was made easy haha...tom only had the small guy left...he said it was too small to tel if it was briareus or a vulgaris...shud i start him out in a 20 gallon since hes so small or throw him in the 75 gallon?
 
Darn, wish I had known he had the vulgaris but then I am getting a new baby briareus next week so tanks could have been a problem :roll:

I've done it both ways except using a 40 gallon WITH a sump (so about 50 gallons). I will probably put the new one in the 40 and transfer Yeti to the 65 but I am debating on this still. A twenty is awfully small even for a little guy. The big problem with starting large is feeding and finding them until they are about 5 months. They are still messy eaters and sensitive to water quality so I would recommend the 75 unless you have something larger or the 20 is piped into the 75.
 
so the little guy didnt make it....are the really small baby octopus even more fragile then lets say a bigger one? so even though a baby will live longer, getting it past the first week is significantly harder? correct me if im wrong
 
We really don't have any kind of tracking to make a good call on what works and what doesn't and why. There are just too many unknown and unrecorded factors. I am never comfortable that one will survive until it is in the tank for a full two weeks. We seem to go along and have great success and then a lot of failures in a cluster. It definitely "seems" that if they survive the first two weeks they live a normal lifespan and die in senescence.
 

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