[Octopus]: Davy Jones - O. hummelincki

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Of all the octopus species I have kept, O. hummelincki inks the most (forgive me if this is redundant ). It is almost as if they slowly make ink and have to reduce the volume (probably the wrong guess but there is something different about them). For all but one of the hummelinckis I have, the inking occurs in small releases and often for no apparent reason and without disaster. The one instance where this was not the case the animal completely blackend the tank and the water bucket I removed her to while she was discharging the ink. Once she stopped and I put her in another aquarium (fortunately I had an appropriate tank available) there was never another problem. I had to do a complete water change on the 60 she polluted. I have no clue why it happened. There is a similar incidence with a vulgaris but sadly there was not a spare, unpolluted tank available and the animal died (which may or may not have been a result of the inability to rehouse it).

Et inks more than others I have kept but it is almost always clear that he has been taken by surprise. He stopped eating well for two days and a large water change solved the problem as well has starting a hand feeding success, something he has not done since the first week in the tank.

Wow, ink incontenence. I'll have to watch out for that, thanks. I had never considered this as a possibility. I have a 20g reef tank and a 20g coral QT tank that I could move him to if needed, but it's good to be prepared mentally that this might happen at some point.

So out of curiosity how would I go about moving Davy if he decided to empty all the ink he could into the tank and blacken it? Are there any tricks to enticing him to get into a container? I still have the one KP Aquatics sent him in, I suppose I could always try to get him back into that if needed.

 

[DWhatley]

Capturing and moving are nerve wracking but not really all that hard. I think I did a video on one move, let me find it (found the video and thread here). In an emergency, you can't do much about acclimation but most of us will be using the same water and keeping our tanks very close in PH and salinity. If the tanks are notably different and you have the ability to acclimate, it may be a good idea but not for a long period of time like you would for shipping as you will induce stress. The other times I have moved animals to larger tanks, I just ensured the PH and salinity were the same before the move and released them immediately.

Getting the octo into a container (I don't recommend the shipping bottle because it won't hold water and trying to move it quickly will cause more stress all around) is the tricky part, once it is sequestered, the move is pretty simple. The instrument I used in the video was made to move fish and had an air opening along the handle to release pressure. It seemed like a good idea when I bought it but it was really a bit small and there was no way to keep the octopus from getting out other than using my hand. Later moves were done with whatever container I had available that I could cover during the move.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Hi all, it's been a while since I updated. Davy is doing well. He's settled into his tank well and has chosen a favorite spot to hang out.

I've been feeding him daily using the Salifert vial method and he seems to be enjoying it. I managed to capture a pretty great video of him feeding:

It's hard to really get an idea of scale from the video (as pointed out by my sister, who asked if he was about the size of a human fist!) so I did a bit of Photoshopping and imposed a picture of a tape measure and battery on top of a screenshot from the video. I've scaled the image so that vial is about the same size in the picture and in the video:

 

[DWhatley]

GREAT video! I wonder what he was looking for in the substrate just after he captured his shrimp. Good idea on for showing scale too!

 

[tonmo]

Oh wow, great update, and definitely appreciate the scale reference... I was thinking the same as your sister. Very cool octo!!

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

GREAT video! I wonder what he was looking for in the substrate just after he captured his shrimp. Good idea on for showing scale too!

Thanks! I think the video came out much better than all the pictures I've tried to take of him. It also illustrates his personality pretty well. He's very enthusiastic when it comes to eating. Sometimes, he takes the vial, contents and all, and retreats with the entire thing back to his favorite hiding place.

Another thing I forgot to mention, at about the 0:09 - 0:13 mark, you can see his split third arm pretty well.

I'm not sure what he was digging around in the substrate for either (I actually hadn't noticed it til you mentioned it). I took this video a while ago, right after I first started feeding him using the "vial" method. It could be he was still unsure what to expect, or was still hungry, and was looking for more food.

 

[DWhatley]

Missed the split arm after four repeats of that section but rewatching all the arms, I think the arms searching the substrate are doing the same thing that the arms getting the vial shrimp are doing, maybe a reflexive type motion.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Missed the split arm after four repeats of that section but rewatching all the arms, I think the arms searching the substrate are doing the same thing that the arms getting the vial shrimp are doing, maybe a reflexive type motion.

Hm, maybe it's easier for me to spot because I know what to look for.

So one thing I noticed more recently (the past 2 days or so) is that Davy appears to be a lot more active. He usually just sits in the same spot on a rock. He's usually out in the open, but camoflauged white with dark spots to blend in to the rock. Recently though, he's been exploring the back and sides of the tank. His movements don't seem to be paniced, but he does move with a certain sense of purpose or urgency. The thing is though, he doesn't appear to be moving to any particular place, and will often change directions, go back to where he already was, then go off in a completely different direction.

Additionally, while he's usually a mottled-white color while sitting on the rocks, when he's doing this aimless wondering, he's usually a tan brown to a very dark, almost black, brownish color.

Does anything about this behavior sound unusual? He's still eating normally; that is to say, he eats daily and voraciously.

 

[DWhatley]

Senescence is almost always paired with lack of eating so my guess is his wandering is mate search related.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Senescence is almost always paired with lack of eating so my guess is his wandering is mate search related.

Thanks a lot DWhatley. I suppose he could just be getting more comfortable in the tank. A few days ago marked his one month of being in the tank. As long as he's eating, I'll take that to mean that he's okay