[Octopus]: Ollie - Abdopus (sp)

I think of octopus personalities a lot like the descriptions of cat's or young children's personalities, if you say they will do something as a response to some stimulation, they will fail to show that behavior soon after the statement (or conversely, if you say they don't do something, they will). I try to find a few, more or less common traits but never seem to be able to make a chart of something meaningful so a lot is anecdotal or remembered but not well documented. I remember Jean Boal comparing trying to study octopus behavior and switching to cuttlefish in a NOVA interview. It took a bit to find it but her quote well points out my point. The article is worth a read but here is the quote I was trying to locate:

In terms of their performance in experiments, octopuses are unbelievably erratic. One day they will be brilliant and for the next five days they'll act like they don't know anything at all. So it actually takes pretty intense statistics to figure out what they know and don't know. In the past, I've had more consistent performances from cuttlefish, although sometimes they like to be erratic, too. In general I've had an easier time interpreting their performances, and they are more consistent than octopuses are.
 
I love your reference to kids and cats, I have plenty of both , and it is always "expect the unexpected ". That's what makes it interesting !
 
One of my post seems to have vanished ? Yesterday Ollie didn't want much to do with me , he pretended to be a rock most of the time and refused food, which didn't surprise me much.
This morning he was much more interactive and came to the glass several times to checkout my hand. Then he did the unexpected , he was just sitting on a rock and I was sitting still watching him, when suddenly he shot up and inked twice, then calmly went to his feeding spot and sat there waiting. I don't know what startled him ,or if he was trying to get my attention so I would feed him. I waited a few minutes before I fed him because I didn't want him to think Ink=feeding . I could be totally wrong about this , but that was the strong impression I got from his actions. After he ate he hung out for a bit then went to bed .
I'm thinking It's time to change the title of this journal , as I'm fairly certain he is some sort of Abdopus .
 
I'm enjoying reading your posts about Ollie. I had an Ollie once, an O. bimaculoides, and documented what she did every day. Every day, when I sat down by her tank to spend some time with her, I waved at her. I thought she would eventually understand that waving meant I would be spending some time with her. Well, imagine my surprise when, after a month or two, Ollie waved back! At first I thought I had just imagined the waving, so I brought in observers and asked them to tell me what they were seeing. They all assured me that they saw Ollie stick out an arm and wave back!
It would be interesting if you or some of the other octo keepers would experiment with waving, and see why results you get.

Nancy
 
I changed the title to show Abdopus (sp) where the sp mean the exact species is unknown or undescribed. If you want it to show something different, let me know.

Inking is not well understood and we don't have the best of handles on how it is used, especially in an aquarium setting and is a primary reason we note the need for a skimmer. DO change an extra quantity of water after an event as it sticks to their gills and can cause breathing difficulty. It is almost certain death if it occurs during shipping because of the low volume of water. In my memory, we have had two animals to ink excessively, blackening the tank. One, El Diablo, died the other, Octavia was placed in an available cycled tank after she stopped pouring ink and survived (but would have died if we had not been home and not been able to remove her from the tank). Anecdotally, I have noticed with O. hummelincki males seem to NEED to expel ink from time to time and will do so in small amounts without obvious provocation.
 
Nancy , I will try waving and see what happens.
Thankfully Ollie only inked a little and I changed out the filters and carbon just in case. It was a little humorous because we were just doing our stare down thing , when he shot off the rocks like someone stuck him with a pin, wish I had that on video.
 
What a relief , Ollie finally caught and ate a fiddler crab this morning :cheers: Which is a good thing because I have 4 dozen crabs and nothing else that will eat them, and while ghost shrimp are ok in a pinch ( I also use them to feed other preds until they are weaned onto frozen foods ) they are not a good long term diet. It's sort of like feeding potato chips to a child, they love them, but really need a variety of more nutritious foods.
 
This is a fun journal to follow! I've had more aculeatus than any other octo over the last several years- enough now that now I've lost count. There are many types of abdopus, but all of the aculeatus I've had spend most of their time out from late afternoon to early evening, and in the morning (from 5-6 to about 9 or 10). Your description of the "Old Man Look" sounds a lot like aculeatus, but none of the photos I saw on your other thread looked like any of the aculeatus I've had.

As you say, it doesn't matter what kind of octo it is now that you have him and he's doing well, but it's still nice to know. If it is aculeatus, then if must be a young one (for some reason, I seem to get a LOT of senescent aculeatus)! I've never had one that tiny, so hopefully you have a baby abdopus of some sort!

I really wish you could get a shot with the lights on- which is NOT hard to do with an "adult" aculeatus.
 
I forgot to add- the BEST octopus I've ever had was the Once-ler (female aculeatus). She absolutely waved!!! My daughters and I inadvertently taught it to wave by always waving to her if she was on the glass when we walked in the room. Then she would wave any time you waved first. Eventually, she'd wave once in a while to us. The very last thing she did- literally with "her dying breath" was to wave to me.

We also "taught" her to "dance." One of the girls invented the "Octo Dance," in which you simply wave your arms and slowly spin. The three of us would stand in the living room and do the Octo Dance when the Once-ler was in the glass. A few times she imitated us, letting go of the glass and dong a slow spin in the tank.

We have had some success with teaching other ottos to wave, but not all of them. The Once-ler is the only one who did the octo dance with us, HOWEVER… We have gotten octopuses in public aquariums out of their hiding spots by doing the "Octo Dance." You look really stupid until it works, then people think you're magic!

All of my abdopuses have enjoyed hunting for hermit crabs, too. There's another thing you can try.
 
Thanks Sedna ,I'm glad you like following along. I've started to wave at Ollie every morning, Nancy said it worked on her octo as well. I don't get much of a response to the wave , however I've started blinking and winking at him when I know he's staring at me and that really gets a response. He'll start bobbing his head , then he will come closer to get a better look. This morning I swear he blinked back, or at least it was whatever they do that looks like a blink.
I got up late this morning ( 4 instead of 2 ) and he was waiting for me. Since I spend about 3 hours with him every morning, he stayed up until 7:30 and I was thrilled. He danced on the glass for 2 hours straight, but when I took the camera out he went to the rocks ,when I put it away he came right back to the glass, what a little stinker. I dropped a crab in and it ran straight to him , he caught it then let it go twice. I guess he wasn't done dancing , because he continued for another hour , then went and caught his breakfast.
I have a large order coming next week from reefcleaners , all my tanks need new cleanup crews, so I ordered extra hermits for Ollie.
 
Ollie seems to have developed a routine , one day he will stay out on the glass and dance for hours then eat a hardy meal. The next day he will lay low, never coming to the glass , but he will spend a lot of time cleaning his den and fussing with the shells around the entrance. He will get the shells arranged just right , reaching around them to pull sand into the cracks. Then suddenly he will push them all out of the way and sit on top of them and stare at me for an hour, then start the fussing and fitting all over again. He did this three times this morning, maybe more ,but I had to go to work.
I put some lego blocks in on Sun. but he totally ignored them. However when I got home from work Mon. night I noticed he had moved them to the farthest area of the tank from his den. This makes some sense because this is also the end he does the most dancing on the glass.

I think he was trying to loosen some suckers or just having fun ,I caught him hanging off the front of the power head ( it's covered with a mesh breeder bag ) It was hilarious, he looked like a dog with his head hanging out of the car window. I didn't find any suckers when I did a water change , but I must admit my eye sight is not the greatest and his suckers are tiny.

He is still eating well and his colors look good so I am holding my breath he passes his 2 week mark.

This is a pic of him sitting on his shell pile staring me down. I had to mess with the colors a bit to make it a little clearer.
20140107_052804_LLS.jpg
 
When they shed it is only a thin skin on the outer part of the sucker. It will look like a white disk of skin with a hole in the middle and you will likely notice a bunch of them floating in the tank.
 
Well Ollie has made it to the 2 week mark in my care :biggrin2: He has started acting a little shy , only dancing on the glass when he thinks I'm not looking , and just hanging on the glass when I'm close to the tank. He sits calmly when I move around and when I work in his tank , but he won't come over to investigate.
He also quit taking the fiddler crabs , so I have to find and fish them out when they die. However I did get him to take and eat some shrimp , so I think that is a step in the right direction , he may have been tired of eating crab. He doesn't seem to be coming out of his den in the evening anymore , but he is staying out later in the morning, yesterday it was until 9:30. Sadly lights still bother him, in a way that may be a good thing, because when he starts tolerating light it may mean the end is closer.
 
He also quit taking the fiddler crabs , so I have to find and fish them out when they die.
I'm not sure how many other carnivorous species you have in the tank, but I have a number of bristle-worms and nassarius snails that make a living on uneaten octopus food. I *think* they help the stability of the water quality by consuming everything before it rots. Just a thought.
 
I definitely like serpent stars for finding uneaten parts (removal is best but clean up crews help a lot with what you don't see). I have also found that pencil urchins have a fondness for dead stuff. They have other attributes that are not so great but I keep one in each octo tank.
 

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