Ocotpus

[macman7010]

I just acquired an octopus from a fairly local fish store. It was aqua cultured so I am hoping that its survival rate is a little better than a wild caught animal.

I have researched octopus care a lot for several years and have the animal currently in only a ten gallon tank. The tank I ordered for it has not come in, it is a 30 gallon long tank, but the animal is small and his new tank should be here early part of next week.

My question involves the feeding of the octopus. He currently is not very active except at night. In his tank I have a sand substrate, a tempature of 72 Degrees F, and a salinity of 1.020. I have read a slightly lower salinity and tempature does well for these animals.

My assumption is it is best to feed them at night time. I dont have any lighting on the octo tank since it seems like lighting just aggitates him, and really is not neccessary. My question is this - are my water paremeters ok - the current filtration is a Whisper 40 with a 200 gallon per hour flow rate. Also I have a large Tetra Tek Deep Water Air Pump flooding the tank with dissolved oxygen - I hear that is of importance as well. To allow him to hide I inserted a clay pot that he loves.

What is the best food for these animals - goldfish, ghost shrimp, crayfish anything else??

 

[beblondie]

Goldfish are never good feeders they are extremely oily,usually in poor shape,and contian a growth destroying enzyme,and a steady diet causes a fatty layer on the liver-Anne

 

[Edmonton Eskimo]

They really like clams

 

[Black96WS6]

Hi Macman,

Don't take this the wrong way, but you really should've done more research before getting that Octo right now.

First off, 1.020 is too low. You will need to increase the salinity to 1.025 or 1.026. Being inverts, they need FULL STRENGTH sea water.

Secondly, DO NOT feed them feeder goldfish. These contain much higher levels of fat than what they eat in the wild and it will die of organ failure if goldfish are its main diet. Ghost shrimp and baby clams (live) are fine when they're small. You can wean them onto frozen food later, however live is always best plus having to catch it gives them something to do and helps them not to get bored. You can feed him hermit/fiddler/etc crabs when he gets a little bigger.

Thirdly, what species do you have? Did the fish store say? Is it a common octopus (vulgaris), a bimac (bimaculoides), etc? Knowing what you have is important to how to take care of it.

Fourthly, do you have lots of rocks or ABS/PVC pipe connectors for him to hide and play in?

Fifthly, octos are extemely intelligent, they get bored easily in small tanks. Make sure you give him new things to play with/look at from time to time (like plastic lego blocks)

Sixthly, keep the lid closed and put a heavy book on it if you have to. Octos are really strong as well as being able to squeeze through the tiniest of holes. If it can get its beak through an opening, it can get its whole body through it.

Seventhly, since you mentioned it was aqua-cultured, it's probably a bimac, you will need to get him out of that 10 gallon pretty quickly, as they grow to a decent size (although not huge). However, make sure that 30 gallon is cycled properly first, they need a mature tank.

Eigthly, they require more oxygen than fish and carry a heavier bio-load, roughly 3 times that of a fish the same size. Do you have enough filtration/skimming to handle it?

Lastly, did I mention you should've done a little more research first?

Octopuses are too intelligent of a creature to bring home and have it die in a month because you didn't know what you were doing (no offense).

 

[malkore]

I have read the minimum tank size for any octopus is 90 gallons. Anything smaller will crowd them, and if you approach the tank too quickly, it'll shoot it's ink, which will poison the water and kill the octopus. with 90gallons, the ink is more diluted, giving you time to do a large water change to get the ink out.

 

[douggiestyle]

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/july2003/invert.htm

ive checked into nearly every statement in this article and have found no major contradictory evidence.

 

[Wolf]

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=47078&highlight=octopus
Look at some of the links in theis thread macman, tonmo.com is a really good site and http://www.tonmo.com/cephcare/cephcarejump.php

Good informative post Black 96
If I'm not mistaken a bimac's minimum tank size should be about 55 gallons.