[Octopus]: Margay - O. Burryi

[DWhatley]

Toys

I could not find an octosafe string of beads in the Dollar General that was on my way to the grocery but I did find one of those crazy plastic twisted straws. Unfortunately when I gave it to Margay I realized the camera was in my office upstairs. I tried just holding it in the water like a feeding stick without food. She watched but did not come to inspect it so I touched the tip of an outstreached arm. She j u s t touched it with a couple of tiny end suckers. When I released it it did not move so she had possession. I moved away from the tank and she took it all under her webbing and tasted it then eventually it was upright again and against the wall with literally ONE sucker attached. I made a point to look directly at the straw and walked toward the tank. She quickly looped the straw in her arm tip so I think she wants to keep it. If she does not get bored with it by tomorrow, I will take some pictures

 

[DWhatley]

Angry Eyes

I have seen red eye lids (I think they are actually the equivalent of our iris but are composed of skin like our eyelids. It does not make sense for an invert to have eye lids ) on a rare occasion with O. hummelincki and it definitely signified a foul mood. Margay shows this color often and I think is does show distrust but may not mean that she is angry.



When I pay attention to her, she often lightens the color but they retain some red (the color can be any of the body colors and white is most common).

I moved Onn to the tank directly across the room from Margay (Onn's nursery tank was not easily visible from Margay's) and she seemed aware that there was now an octopus in that tank. She paced much of the day.

 

[DWhatley]

Margay is getting pissy in her maturity. The other night she came out to the front of the tank when I let the dogs out so I opened the top and stuck my fingers inside, well to the side of her. She does not see well at close quarters so we are very careful to make water motion when we put our hands in the tank in an attempt (usually a failure) to keep from startling her. She came over to my hand and pulled then sprayed a quantity of "water" out of the tank (mostly missing me). This is a first for her but I did not think much about it until the morning. With the lights on, the wet spot on the floor was INK, not water.

Tonight, Neal was feeding the polyps with a pipette and dropped it in the water. It just "disappeared" and as he went looking for it, Margary found it and claimed it as her own. When Neal tried to reach for it she inked and took it into her den. Neal tried to trade for a piece of shrimp but she was not willing to relinquish her prize (but did take her shrimp).

 

[DWhatley]

Tonight I saw Margay swimming. It is not very unusual to see a young octo occasionally swim in a tank but not common as they become adults (probably because of the lack of space). She will sometimes swim a foot or so to the transparent end of her tank and bump her mantle but tonight she repeatedly walked to about the 1/3 mark and then swam to the night lit end, then walked back to the dark side (toward her den). This is the opposite direction for other short swims and she seemed to have a good idea when the end wall approached (end wall on the night lit side has a black background vs clear window on the den side. After stopping at the wall she sort of treaded water for a few seconds then walked back along the front of the glass to the dark side. Onn is not out and I wonder if she is trying to get his attention as they were "flirt" dancing earlier today.

 

[DWhatley]

We lost Margay today in the worst possible way. I have only had an octopus escape a tank once before and that was because the top was left open. Tonight Margay did not come out to watch me set up the vitamins. This is her nightly human observation and she never fails to come to the end of the tank where I set up the shot glasses. I found this odd but she has been behaving a bit strangely and I have been afraid she would start brooding soon. I could not see her in her normal sleeping quarters but let it go until after dinner. When she still did not show, I started a serious hunt and eventually moved around her rocks. She is large enough that I should have been able to find her easily. Searching around her tank, in her sump and around the other tanks produced no octopus. When Neal went down stairs to watch TV, he called to me that he found her. She had crossed the tank room and managed to descend 13 steps before dieing. Some of her chromatophores were still firing but she was not moving or breathing. I will post final measurements later but am too sad to take them out of the camera just yet.

We are not sure how she escaped but the latch on her top has never been locked (with her or others). I had recently mentioned that this kind of top with lowered water levels seems to work well without weights or locks ..."it works until it doesn't"

 

[nevergirl86]

I'm so sorry for your loss. I guess the phrase: "Curiosity killed the cat", could be tweaked a little for octopuses... Again, so sorry to hear about Margay.

 

[haggs]

sorry to hear this D, not good at all.

 

[DWhatley]

Really, really hard to come home and try to avoid looking for her. She was not so much interactive as active and one of the special animals I have kept.

 

[Cephdoc]

Really, really hard to come home and try to avoid looking for her. She was not so much interactive as active and one of the special animals I have kept.

I just read through this, and I am sorry for the loss. I really enjoyed reading about her and seeing her.

 

[DWhatley]

Final Photo

As is customary for my last journal post (and encouraged for others but it is very difficult - mentally - to do) I took photos of Margay with a measuring tape in an attempt to document sizing.