bimac eating a fiddler

[ionredline0260]

quick video from my cellphone of my bimac eating a fiddler crab.
Enjoy! (sorry for the quality)

 

[SandV]

OMG... I have a slow octo.... My bimac is the same size as yours.. maybe a bit bigger and he CAN NOT kill a fiddler... and yes it is the same size as that fiddler... He will try for a LONG time and then lets it go...

 

[Animal Mother]

OMG... I have a slow octo.... My bimac is the same size as yours.. maybe a bit bigger and he CAN NOT kill a fiddler... and yes it is the same size as that fiddler... He will try for a LONG time and then lets it go...

That's strange. I had an O. mercatoris that would take down fiddlers as big as himself. Sometimes he would have to retreat and come up with another plan of attack, but in the end he always won.

If I remember correctly, DHyslop had a shy young Bimac that didn't seem to know how to conquer crabs.

 

[SandV]

He gets them and trys and trys and trys and just when you think he must have killed it you come in and check on him again and sure enough the crab is sitting there alive and well... all body parts in tact... He loves food... he will take food even when he is full... he carries it around and protects it from his (one day meal) two damsels... he doesn't want you to touch it.... He will sit in a clam for 24 hours... and he will MULTIPLE attempts to with the fiddler but then.... nothing...

hermits seem to take him QUITE some TIME to get... and sometimes unsuccessfully after hours.... One especially that is in a bright white turbo shell... How big could his beak be?... his mantel is still about an inch... I would think the could get into to hermit shell with no problem... they are medium sized hermits...

 

[Nancy]

This was advice from Neogonodactylus on the size of prey (advising about food for small octopus described as a pygmy, August post)

Small crabs, hermits, shrimp, amphipods and thumbnail clams all work well, but as a rule of thumb, you probably don't want to try prey that are more than 1/3 to 1/2 the size of the mantle.

That's good advice - does your octo have trouble with fiddlers that fall into this size category?

Nancy

 

[SandV]

the fiddlers are from aquaculturestore.com... so the body of the crab is about half the size as his mantle...

 

[SandV]

If you watch the video it has be be pretty close to the same sizes.... he can get them with no problem and can hold them for more than an hour and then... they are sitting next to eachother