new cuttlefish and question about eating

[KevinFJB]

Hi Everyone,

I'm new to the board and have just received a new S. bendensis cuttle (~ 2 1/2-3" long) yesterday. My plan to drip acclimate the cuttle was cut short as it inked in its bag while I was floating it to adjust temp. and get the drip line set up. I knew that my salinity, measured by refractometer was the same in my tank as that of the store and also so was the pH. Since it inked in the bag after floating for ~15-20 minutes I decided to open it up and let it in. After a couple of hours I added a ghost shrimp which was eaten immediately and then another an hour later was also eaten immediately. The cuttle also looked good this morning and I fed it again.

So after a long build up, here is my question: Is it correct to think, despite not properly acclimating by drip, that since it is eating, that it has settled in fairly well? I know from keeping a reef tank with a variety of fish that those newly introduced that start to eat is a good sign. Thanks for your help, I'm going to post some pics in a few days once the cuttle feels more secure moving around in the tank.

Kevin.

 

[Nancy]

Yes, eating and moving about are good signs.

Do you have any other food than ghost shrimps for it? It's fairly large, so it might accept thawed frozen shrimp if you waved it about on a feeding stick.

Nancy

 

[KevinFJB]

Yes, eating and moving about are good signs.

Do you have any other food than ghost shrimps for it? It's fairly large, so it might accept thawed frozen shrimp if you waved it about on a feeding stick.

Nancy

Thanks for the repy Nancy...I will supplement with small crabs (some htichhikers from live rock in my reef aquarium that I have been saving and will use a length of 1/4" rigid tubing for a feeding stick with shrimp and other meaty items. is there a general timeline for the weaining process?

 

[joel_ang]

The cuttle will simply eat anything that's under 1.5 times it's size and looks like food. When mentioning your cuttle's size were you refering to mantle length of overall length?

One more thing, if your cuttle does not recognise the thawed shrimp as food, try using the feeding stick to place the food at the tip of its arms. Normally it'll feel it for a second or two then proceed to eat it (they do this to fingers too so watch out ).

 

[bananaice96]

where did you get a bandensis that large? was it online?

 

[KevinFJB]

The cuttle will simply eat anything that's under 1.5 times it's size and looks like food. When mentioning your cuttle's size were you refering to mantle length of overall length?

One more thing, if your cuttle does not recognise the thawed shrimp as food, try using the feeding stick to place the food at the tip of its arms. Normally it'll feel it for a second or two then proceed to eat it (they do this to fingers too so watch out ).

Thanks for the info, and the measurement estimate is overall end-to-end length (may be more 2 to 2 1/2" after closer inspection last night while it was crusing around the tank)

 

[KevinFJB]

where did you get a bandensis that large? was it online?

No my local reef shop ordered it for me (place called Reef Raft, in Mississauga, Ontatio) and is excellent at getting hard to find items such as rare corals, marine fish, inverts...cuttles and octos seem to be relatively tough to get in Canada but I did call Octopets prior to recieving this one and Tyler thought that he could ship to the Toronto, Canada area...I wasn't sure if cuttles were covered under CITES or not.