Giant Cuttlefish?????

[heydiddlesquiddle]

G'day Folks,
I'm wondering if anyone knows if the giant cuttlefish found in southern australia is suitable for a large aquarium?

The reason i ask is because a good friend of mine lives near wyalla in South Australia and following a documentary on tv about these remakable creatures, he has since found a location where the females do thier breeding.
He suggested to me that next season they breed, he will try to locate some of the eggs or larvae and raise some if he can.
I am currently designing a new house to build and I am looking at building in some rather large aquariums as divider walls between lounge and dining rooms. These walls will be about 7 metres long and about 2 feet wide. I'm thinking of the tanks beuing full length and width but only about 2 feet deep. Would this suffice to raise a giant cuttlefish in until time where it outgrows the tank and will be released to the wild?

Tony.

 

[Colin]

Hi Tony

I'm sure that a tank of the size you are suggesting would do S. apama for a while but as they get to about 3 feet long it may only be for a few months. So, as you said, you will probably have to let them go after a while...

Let me know if you need some info on big tanks, that's a speciality of mine

C

 

[heydiddlesquiddle]

Hi Colin,

Thanks for the reply.

I'm keen to build one or two of these tanks into the design of this house.

What sort of filtration would you reccomend??

I was thinking of underground filtration the full length and probably a series of 2000 gallon/hr pumps.

Would this suffice for a tank that holds roughly 600 gallons???

Tony.

 

[Colin]

Hi
yeah i make that out at about 630 gallons plus normally take away 10% for dispacement and the fact that water doesnt go all the way to the top of the tank. (560)

The key to a tank that size if simply havning a large enough surface area to cope with the amount of waste that animals that size are going to produce. In your favour though, a larger tank is much more stable than a small tank so you will have more warning before bad events happen but you will still need to be very aware of your test results etc, at least to start with.

For a tank that size i would recommend a big skimmer (something like an aquamedic 5000 twin) and a large trickle filter which you could make yourself quite easily. You will need several powerheads within th etank for sufficient water movement.

A flidised sand bed may be another option but my advice is to look at severa; sites that offer info on filters and see which one suits you best... I can advise later if you want...

Here is a link to the largest filter that i set up, you can probably follow links from there...
http://www.tmc-ltd.co.uk/catalog/central_filt/2500&5000_filtration.asp cheers
Colin

 

[snafflehound@work]

Any idea why the Giant Cuttlefish is so much smaller, relatively speaking, than the Giant Squid and Giant Octopus? Or maybe there is an undiscovered species of cuttle out there that grows to lengths of 10m or more?

 

[Jean]

Hmmmm Hadn't thought much about it but it may have to do with the energetics of making a calcium carbonate "cuttlebone" over the relatively thin chitinous pen. It probably takes a lot more energy.

My Guess anyway!!!!!

J

 

[erich orser]

My dream ceph tank could easily accommodate a giant cuttle or a GPO. To see this ideal environment, rent the 1962 Eon Production "Dr. No". For that matter, the subterranean domicile surrounding the aquarium seems to be the way I decorate anyway. Now if I just had a million dollars and the right Nehru jacket... think I could do without the metal hands, though.

Anyway, back to the serious discourse:

I had a ceph-mentor in my late teens who seemed incapable of talking about any kind of cephalopod without grossly exaggerating their maximum sizes. Three-foot cuttles thus became six-footers, fifty-foot squid became hundred-foot squid, etc. The only ten meter cuttles I've ever seen were in a long-sold painting of mine, but we can always hope!