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University project rearing paralarvae

Joined
Apr 22, 2013
Messages
7
Hello, this is my first post and I will get to the point.
I am a first year university student studying marine science in Britain, I am beginning to plan my dissertation as I am on a foundation degree.
I have discussed options with my lecturer and I may be able to culture octopus as part of it.
I am having problems, as I need octopus eggs in a few months time and I cant find any aquariums that have any live eggs.
I hope you can help me to locate any eggs within the next few months and possibly provide help.
I have contacted experts and visited aquariums, so I now have an idea on the set up and general keeping. I may try my hand at cuttlefish soon for a bit of a practise run.
 
:welcome: natalie!

I don't have any direct source suggestions but you might contact some of the local (assuming you are on a coast) fishermen and tell them you are looking for an adult female and explain your need. They won't be able to tell if she has mated (and will have problems identifying a female) but an adult female is almost a sure bet for having mated and may lay eggs about the time you need them.

Now, about the eggs. Since you are in Britain, I assume you are looking for O. vulgaris and know that this is what is arbitrarily called a small egg species. There have been numerous attempts to raise the planktonic young but success has not been achieved (a very few have reached the benthic stage). There is currently a group attempting to raise them for food production and there are a few articles about Octo farming in the Raising Octopuses From Eggs subforum. Although at least one of the farms are separating mother from eggs, for the size of your experiment, CaptFish's suggestion of allowing the mother to raise them until hatching is most likely to have the best success to that point.

If you need an octopus that is plausible to raise to maturity, you will need to search out a large egg species. These are still not easily raised but hobbyists have had a little luck with O. bimaculoides (US Pacific), O. mercatoris (US Caribbean), and O. briareus (US Caribbean). I am not familiar with a UK species that is large egged.

I try to remember to suggest new members edit their profile and add a displayed location. I find city, state/province and country most helpful but some members prefer to be a bit more creative. Giving a stong hint does help with sourcing and food recommendations as well as sharing local availability information.
 
I have done a lot of research on this topic and I want to try small egged octopus, i know I am highly likely to fail at this culturing, but part of my project will involve a literature review on culturing octopus. I have already done part of this based around O. vulgaris. I will also be creating cultures of mysis and other food sources. My project is not based around only rearing octopus from eggs, but I would like to put my research into practise and see if any of my theories may have some success.
 
I am tempted to put out an advert to local dive clubs to see if they will be more successful, obviously, fishermen are less likely to bring up an undamaged octopus, while divers may find an egg clutch.
 
Have you seen the paper on genetic analysis of the gut content of O. vulgaris paralarvae? If not, I have it somewhere.... Welcome to TONMO!
 

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