• Looking to buy a cephalopod? Check out Tomh's Cephs Forum, and this post in particular shares important info about our policies as it relates to responsible ceph-keeping.

Ethical Considerations for Keeping Octopus in Captivity

tonmo;88389 said:
Thanks Thales - very helpful and thanks for the resources. I am up for doing something in this space on behalf of the community; I'll dig in a bit. My bottom line is that I do support keeping of cephs in a responsible manner. I believe in the long run the more we can understand these creatures, the better. Keeping them a "mystery" doesn't jibe with my perception of we humans being a good, ambitious species eager to understand as much as possible about the world we live in and the creatures we co-exist with, with the general intent of making things better. So it seems appropriate that we examine the process by which folks obtain these cephs, and improve on that first to make sure it's humane and efficient.


An important thing to remember is that there are lots and lots of different collection stations and they are often not connected to other stations. So, each station needs to be 'educated' about best practices. The cephs that came in last week were packed very well, and I think the ceph mortality (4 of 10 cuttles DOA, 1 more DAA, and 1 'common' occy out of 6 and no 'zebras' out of 2) was because the shipment was delayed - a 30-40 hour trip turned into a 60 hour trip.
Some of the smaller collecting stations are figuring out if they take better care of the animals, they get more repeat business.
 
Let me comment as someone who formally studies octopus and who has photographed Wunderpus in its natural habitat and who has purchased two from wholesalers. Members of my lab have also photographed and filmed the mimic in Indonesia although the only ones I have seen were in the trade. If I want to study the behavior and life history of these species, I have to have a permit from the host country. They are very difficult to obtain and it can take months or even years to do so. Even if I have a research permit, if I want to bring the animals back to the lab in Berkeley, I would need an export permit (again difficult to obtain) and be able to figure out a way to transport them. (Not being able to carry them on board is causing serious problems for those of us who relied on using this method to safely transport live specimens.) The bottom line is if I could get a permit (currently unlikeley), it would cost me in excess of $4,000 (conservative estimate) to travel to Indonesia, obtain the services of a dive boat, pay for the expenses of an Indonesian colleague to work with me (probably necessary as part of the permitting process), and transport the animal back to the U.S. Even if I could obtain a permit to collect 4 (unlikely), that puts them at over $1,000 each and it is unlikely that they would all make it back alive. Very few biologists are going to be collecting and bringing back live zebra octopus.

Also, there is very little to be gained studying the behavior of these species in a laboratory or aquarium setting. The animals are stressed, the habitat is not at all similar to that in which they live, it is difficult to obtain two to obsever interactions, etc. While there are several species of octopus that we can and do study in the lab, zebras are not on that list. In my opinion, most useful behavioral information can only be obtained in the field. (The only exception is that we have learned a bit about their brooding behavior and early paralarvae which would have been difficult in the field. And even here, once it has been observed and recorded, there is little need to repeat the observations.)

So why did I purchase two from wholesalers? This was a few years ago when we did not have information on reproductive behavior and I was hoping to see brooding. Also there were very few specimens in the hands of museums, the species were still to be described, and we needed fresh (non-formalin) material for molecular studies to determine their relationship to other octopus. (This still has not been properly worked out.)

Once these octopus have been collected and removed from their home environment, they have zero fitness - they are evolutionarily dead. That makes it easy for many people to rationalize buying them because they will die anyway and won't contribute to their population. The sad fact is that if we pay a high price for them and allow the collectors, wholesalers, and store owners to make a profit on them, they will continue to be collected. When I purchased the two animals, at the time I made it clear that I did not want any more ordered for me. I will no long obtain these animals in the name of science. I have preserved specimens which have been deposited in museums and I have their DNA. There is nothing else I want them for in Berkeley and I certainly hope that in the future there are still zebras in Indonesia that I can properly study in the field. That is where they belong and that is where we can learn the most from them.

Roy
 
sorseress;88401 said:
Thales, do you know any stats on how long it takes to clear customs and fish and wildlife? How many hours that adds to the packing, shipping etc. time?

All of that depends on the how long before the flight the local airport wants the shipment, and how long it takes the wildlife and and customs to clear the shipment. Sometimes customs and fish and game are backed up and it can take hours and hours. Usually, it adds an hour or two.
 
I agree with Robyn that it's important to consider the ethics separately for the cases of the individual animals and the wild population as a whole. Much of TONMO's hobbyist advice is aimed at encouraging ceph-keepers to be as well-educated and responsible for the well-being of their pets, and I think, unless we take the stand that they shouldn't be kept at all, that's something we're doing quite well.

It seems like the other case, the impact of collection on the wild population, is a whole other kettle of fish, so to speak. There are a lot of components to this being tossed out in this discussion, ranging from economics to transportation logistics to collection priorities to importing to regulation.... ultimately, these are probably the main areas in which we could affect change somehow, although how is not clear.

Robyn touched on something that seems key, though: the impact that collection has on the wild population depends heavily on the life cycle of the animal. It also, of course, depends on a lot of factors in the wild, such as its habitat and how easy it is for collectors to capture a large fraction of the population. Some animals are so easy to collect, because their natural defenses are not at all well suited to avoiding human assault, that they can be over-collected with ease-- I put seahorses in this category, since their main defenses are to hide among plants and to have armor and generally not be a good meal, but neither of these protect against major netting efforts. (When they're to be sold dried as a medicinal product, it's even easier to collect them).

In the case of cephs, it's rather hard to assess the impact of collection on the adult population. Coleoids seems to generally share the reproductive strategy of producing very large clutches of eggs and (para)larvae, but to have relatively little chance of each baby reaching sexual maturity and reproducing. I'm not sure how to assign even back-of-the-envelope numbers to this: it means that the population can theoretically bounce back rapidly from a small population to a large one, particularly since they have a short lifetime to reproductive age. However, it also means that removing adults or near-adults from the breeding population can have a very rapid impact on the reproductive capacity of the whole species, and also narrows the gene pool. One thing I'm pretty sure it means is that collection of hatchlings is much less likely to have an impact on the wild population than collection of adults, since the survival rate for a hatchling is very low anyway... it also arguably(?) offsets the cruelty of pulling the animal from its natural environment when its natural environment is full of nasty hazards, so it would give it more of a chance at a long and non-traumatic life.

I don't know that it's at all practical to somehow encourage collectors to collect paralarvae instead of adults, and of course they'd have to be raised for a while before sale, but I bet they're easier to ship.

In a completely tangential thought, I wonder if this reproductive strategy was part of why Coleoids survived mass extinctions that wiped out all other ceph populations, in that a few octopus-ancestors that had some particular mutation that helped handle the environmental conditions leading to the mass extinction could have expanded to fill niches left by other animals that weren't able to handle the changes.

Anyway, I know Eric Hochberg advised the California Fish & Game regulators to forbid bimac collection for the hobby trade because he believed that it would be easy for heavy collection to wipe out the breeding population of bimacs in the wild. I infer, at least, that a lot of you with experience in this area are concerned about that in the case of the "zebras" as well. Of course, this also ties into the discussion elsewhere about how overfishing of terminal-spawning squids is likely to impact their populations differently than overfishing of animals that have different reproductive strategies and timelines.

I've noticed, though, that several of the other animals that have been brought up recently (particularly Tasmanian Tigers and Hog Island Boas) seem like they have very different life and reproductive cycles than the cephs... Fish are closer in some ways, but I don't know enough about their details. Assessing how the animal's actual lifecycle will interact with various pressures, whether they be overfishing/overcollection, habitat destruction, water temperature changes, invasive species, or any of a number of other things is a very complicated problem. Of course, it's generally better to err on the side of caution, since it's not always easy to tell what impact these things are having on a population until it's an irreversible problem, but it seems worthwhile to look for as many answers as possible along the way, lest the conservation strategy turn out to be a case of "the cure is worse than the disease," or just putting a lot of effort into addressing one part of the problem, when the highest impact on the species' survival might be in some other area.

:twocents: from me, is that sufficient to maintain my reputation for "walls of text," Dan? (I considered trying out e e cummings formatting for this post, but old habits die hard)
 
monty;88408 said:
is that sufficient to maintain my reputation for "walls of text," Dan?

Once again you trumped my effort. A mere two paragraphs takes me a half hour: you could partition Germany in that time :smile:
 
The two examples I mentioned are in no way different...they are mirrors of what we can see in regards to the wild importation of cephalopods.

There is NO reason to import some species, other than as "crank" items.

We don't have even a modicum of experience with bimacs so far, and yet, the new arrivals are being snatched up as fast as they arrive. Two importers in town here are actively looking for more wonderpuss to fill orders that they have.

Are you seriously tryiing to tell me that there is no impact from this? Where does this end? Haven't you listened to Dr. O'Shea? Haven't you watched the news?

People, if you really care for cephs, (or any living animal for that matter) we have got to wake up and smell the coffee.


There is nothing wrong with collecting from a sustainable population...to a point. Thales is completely correct that legislation is the key to this. Problem= people don't want to hear it.

We don't want to hear that you won't be able to eat fish in 2040. Your children will never have a tuna fish sandwich that is safe to eat, even if tuna still exist.

Are we honestly justifiable in keeping cephs in captivity?

Yes, I believe we are.

They may well become the foodstuffs of tomorrow, with a fast reproduction rate and quick life cycle. (personally, can't stand the taste...would rather eat two legged mutton)

But, you have to question whether or not it is responsible to keep them in captivity, especially those of unknown population amounts.
 
Had a depressing conversation with an animal wholesaler/importer yesterday...it sounds like wild ceph imports are going to reach an all-time high this year, the demand keeps on growing and growing, but the lack of education on the part of the purchasers is disturbing.

Be sure to tell people at your lfs about Tonmo, with Thales, Colin, Nancy, and Carol on board, at least the new stuff will have a chance at life, and maybe we can start to puzzle out some of the gaps we are missing in octopus care.
 
There's no reason to import any octopus, really. From mercatoris to briareus to bimacs pretty much any reasonable pet octo is available domestically. Compare the experiences with these animals versus imported "brown" and "bali" octopuses! The only import that anyone seems to have much luck with is A. aculeatus.

Even cuttlefish don't need much in the way of imports--Rich and Jennifer have demonstrated that you can get a whole lot of babies from a handful of imported eggs.

I work for an aquarium service company with a retail store in New England--when they first found out about my ceph fetish I was told that I was the only customer they had who they would suggest an octopus for, because I'm one of the only ones who would give it daily attention. Its not the panacea, but there is a lot of responsibility at the retail-end not to sell or order anything the customer asks for.

Dan
 
Greg, good point. I know we want to provide a TONMO.com flyer for LFS's to give to their ceph-buying customers, kind of like, "here, take this flyer, visit this site to give and get support and guidance" -- I will try to post this soon, for anyone who can help spread the word.
 
Quoting Monty, from the wall of text:

I'm not sure how to assign even back-of-the-envelope numbers to this: it means that the population can theoretically bounce back rapidly from a small population to a large one, particularly since they have a short lifetime to reproductive age. However, it also means that removing adults or near-adults from the breeding population can have a very rapid impact on the reproductive capacity of the whole species, and also narrows the gene pool. One thing I'm pretty sure it means is that collection of hatchlings is much less likely to have an impact on the wild population than collection of adults, since the survival rate for a hatchling is very low anyway..


There is an emerging branch of mathematical ecology attempting to answer exactly these sorts of questions. From memory I think its called elasticity analyses. Basically all the population parametres (hatching success, mortaility in each year or each month, probability of surviving to reproductive age, probability of reproducing given survival to maturity etc.) are plugged into a model and it outputs those factors that will have the greatest impact on survival and population growth. The downside is that they require at least ball-park knowledge of each parametre, something which I imagine is lacking for many cephs.

However I think there are some papers out there comparing r and k selection strategies (in fish, I suspect) and elasticities of adult versus juvenile mortality. Although there's no substitute for knowledge of the species at hand, we can make some good guesses using data for animals with similar life histories.

I think somewhere there is an excellent example analysis on whales (extreme k-selected), that shows a population crash 20-30 years after high juvenile mortality. Slightly OT, but interesting stuff. (if you're a massive nerd like me, that is...)
 
Being an experienced and responsible Ceph owner for many years, I feel I want to "rescue" animals I see for sale cause I know with me they have a fighting chance of living a good life in captivity. I think that is an awesome idea educating your LFS about Tonmo and directing future ceph owners here for guidance.
 
Having a TONMO.com brochure or flyer is a good idea. I've even thought of business card with the TONMO name and website address on it that could be given to ceph purchasers. If material like this was printable at home, we could print out copies and distribute them locally. Might give us a chance to talk with the LFS owner, too.

Even when given our website address, not all octo purchasers bother to log on, unfortunately.

Greg, what species are they importing, and from which areas?

I know of two LFSs in the Dallas area that want to move in the direction of the rare and exotic (fish and other inverts, as well as cephs), so this might be a trend.

Nancy
 
I think a flyer is a good idea, I think it would be even better with a bunch of facts on it. I also think trying to make relationships with the online saltwater communities might be a good idea - many aren't really going to want to send people to TONMO, but its worth a shot. I am an admin on reefs.dot org, and could prolly get a ceph forum started with a post with a link to tonmo and I think it would be easier to get with a reciprocal link and reciprocal forum.
Also, connecting with the online sellers of cephs and having them put a link to TONMO with there cephs for sale might be good too.

The downside is that most stores or sites that are selling cephs are not going to want to be connected to any site that says 'don't by a ceph' because they want to sell cephs. Wonderpus gets even stickier - Atlantis isn't going to want to link to us because they sell most of the wunderpus in this area.



Nancy - the cephs are mostly coming from indo, but they are coming from just about any place that has cephs.
 
I agree...a pamphlet of some sort would be great.

That still skirts the issue of "is this ethical" ? Yes, reality dictates that we are going to see an upsurge in cephalopods in captivity, especially when TFH hits the shelves. How do we address this?


Thales, with the other thread being closed down by Colin, I will try to address your concerns on this one.
 

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