ID HELP

[Elazar Sontag]

Hi All,

I am new to this forum and I highly appreciate any help. I'm completely ignorant to the different kinds of octopi. Recently I was in Korea and at the live seafood markets (yikes) and there were thousands of live octopus. The ones I am interested in identifying and learning more about are small and never seemed to be larger than about 9 or 10 inches big. It is possible I have clumped more than one kind of octopus together in my pictures.

Thanks for the help identifying!

Best,

E

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Some more pictures...

 

[robyn]

Hi Elazar,

I can't really help with ID but wow, those pictures make me sad for those octopuses, all squashed in there together.. that's the nature of the live seafood trade though.

I see from your profile pic you're in Oakland - I'm at SF State so hi from another Bay area cephalopod enthusiast!

I hope you can get some help with ID from one of our more experienced ceph ID'ers (Denise??)

 

[DWhatley]

Unfortunately, I can't help either BUT do take a look at @davelin315 's thread on the Asian market Korean octopuses he attempted (with little success) to raise as I believe they are the same species. One important question you can answer is, "What is the temperature of the animals tank?". If you can determine where they were caught and also provide temp for their native environment, that would also be great to add to the info should others find and attempt keeping them. These are clearly a common species but from an area that does not have much written about species of the food.

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Hi! Despite not being able to keep them alive for a huge amount of time, not that that is not a significant problem, do you know what the species is presumably called?
Thanks for the help!
Best,
Elazar

 

[DWhatley]

I don't think Dave ever had a comfortable call on the species but I will attempt to get his attention.

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Hi all,

Thanks for the help so far. The octopi seemed to be caught very close to where they are sold at the fish markets, meaning they were living off the Korean coast of Incheon. I have had very limited success in my attempts to identify so far. I did find out that in Korea they are called Nakji or Sannakji but that seems to refer only to the dish they are served in, not to the octopus itself. I can't understand how such a common market octopus is so hard to find the name of. They were EVERYWHERE I looked when I was in Korea but I can't for the life of me find out what variety they were.
Any more help would be greatly appreciated.

Elazar

 

[DWhatley]

Thanks, I am putting a link here to the temperature info from NOAA and will cross reference your findings on Dave's thread for future interest.

If I recall correctly, Dave found the same info on the food name but the primary ingredient is simply octopus.

Taking a different approach with the location in mind, I did find a foody reference that gave a the common name, octopus ocellatus (Octopus fangsiao), of a different local octopus (calling the one we are looking for "the common octopus" which is clearly it is not vulgaris).

Jukkumi, or octopus ocellatus, is about 10 to 20 centimeters smaller than the common octopus. The common octopus has a firm texture, and one of its eight legs is longer than the others, but jukkumi has a tender texture and eight limbs of the same length. Jukkumi is mostly caught from October to May, but it tastes best in the spring when its head is filled with eggs. Jukkumi eggs are very much like rice in terms of color, shape, and size, and they have a mild, yet delicious taste.

I may have found it under the common name webfoot octopus (Octopus/Amphioctopus membranaceus) but I am still checking for a confirming photo match and species ID.

Here is the little I could find under the name (so far) but I think @mucktopus might be able to add info.

FAO (FAO SPECIES CATALOGUE FIR/S125 Vol. 3 VOL. 3. CEPHALOPODS OF THE WORLD AN ANNOTATED AND ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF SPECIES OF INTEREST TO FISHERIES) catalog description
Edit: argh! I can't link the pdf because it is an ftp (download) but you can cut and paste this URL to your browser navigation line to activate the download and then scroll down to page 206 (physically page 7 of 8 of the download):

ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/009/ac479e/AC479E33.pdf

I am not over confident with the find though. Does the animal have a false eyespot just below the eyes? It would be a brown dot surrounded by a open brown circle. I can imagine one from the photos but do not see a clear marking.

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Hmmmm. I can't say any of my photos show a false eye spot below the eye. If more photos would help, I will post a bunch more. Thanks again!

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Also, could you relink the FAQ Catalog? That link does not work

 

[DWhatley]

I edited the original. Because the link is to an FTP download, it fails to directly open but you can copy the ftp url and paste it to your browser. It is a bit slow to load but you will only load 8 pages (not the humongous catalog). The membranaceus information is on page 206 of the catalog but page 8 of the download.

Here is a link to access the whole FAO cephalopod catalog . It is not a download but gives access to several options. I have found it best to Google, "FAO octopus" followed by the species name but there is also a linked index that will get a minimal download for the species (as with the 8 page section link above).

 

[davelin315]

I believe these to be Japanese Long Arm Octopi. My research led me to believe that they are a mud flat dwelling species but can also be found in deeper waters in the Sea of Japan. They are a large egg species and I have witnessed only ne eating in my attempts to keep them and another that lived for 4 months but never ate. I kept them at around 60-65 degrees and found the most success in that range although they are kept at 50 degrees in food markets here in the states. I also witnessed mating when I kept them but it was aggressive enough to kill both in their weakened condition. I have a few videos that I think are linked in my Asian Food Market Octopus thread.

 

[Elazar Sontag]

Hi @davelin315! Thanks SO much. I believe you are correct in your identification. Now I am going to start focusing on some more extensive research attempts with that limited knowledge. Do you know what their scientific name is? Tenaga Dako seems to be their Japanese name but that does not provide any more search results than just typing in "Japanese long arm octopus". What I am really trying to get at is more detailed photos of them. If you have any clear photos I would appreciate them greatly.
Thanks again!

 

[Elazar Sontag]

If you go to around :20 in this video

and skip ALL the rest of it... that is the kind of octopus I kept seeing at every fish market in Korea. I believe we are talking about the same kind. @davelin315 does that look like the same one you are talking about?