What are you feeding your octopus?

[neensommers]

What are you feeding your octopus

I was making my lists of wants and needs for this new baby. I am 20 weeks along now

And was wondering what your recommendations are for your favorite and most needed items to have for when the baby arrives...and beyond

thanks so much
Joni

 

[DWhatley]

Fiddler crabs and patience

 

[DWhatley]

I found a couple of abstracts about feeding and growth. Unfortunately, they are not new but are still worth the short read.

Abstract:

Alternative diets for maintaining and rearing cephalopods in captivity

Abstract:

Advances in the laboratory culture of octopuses for biomedical research

 

[TDean]

Hi,I live on Long Island and have had an octopus for about 3 months now and i have been feeding him Fiddler crabs that i was getting from a beach near me. I don't really know much about Fiddler crabs and i was wondering if they will come out during the winter, and if not were do people on this site get crabs from or what do they feed their octopuses during the winter?

 

[DWhatley]

If I am not mistaken you will have difficulty finding the fiddlers in the winter in NJ (hopefully Carol will see your post and can give a for sure answer) so you will need to move to Florida for the winter If that is not an option, then Paul Sachs is a wonderful supplier year round.

 

[DWhatley]

Articles about feeding Octopuses

During some of my octo rabbit trails I came across these articles discussing attempts to feed octopuses fish diets. The studies were done to see if commercial animals could be raised more economically as food.

Article(PDF): Experimental evaluation of the energy balance in Octopus vulgaris, fed ad libitum on a high-lipid diet
Note: fatty fish (high-lipid diet) were fed and evaluated against crabs, mollasks, etc (low-lipid high-protein)

... the low AE values of the present study
support that, for octopuses, high-lipid diets are less
efficient and have a reduced capacity for growth in
comparison to low-lipid and high-protein diets.

Article(HTML): Growth and mortality of common octopus (Octopus vulgaris) fed a monospecific fish diet.
Note: Groups of vulgaris octopuses were exclusively fed mackerel for 72 days

Because cephalopods have a very low lipid digestibility (O'Dor et al. 1984, Lee 1994, Mazon et al. 2007), high quantities of lipids in the digestive tract may obstruct the absorption of amino acids, thus affecting growth (Garcia Garcia & Cerezo Valverde 2006). Fatty diets such as mackerel and sardine might certainly not be sufficient for the good nutrition of octopuses, and complements should be necessary.

Full Article (PDF or URL): The use of alternative prey (crayfish, Procambarus clarki, and hake, Merlucius gayi) to culture Octopus vulgaris (Cuvier 1797)
Note:

The results indicate that crayfish is not an adequate replacement for the usual prey to fatten octopus... None of the 36 octopuses died during the experiment. A higher final weight was registered in octopuses fed squid than in animals fed crayfish

 

[rryyddeerr]

i have what appears to be O. Merc. I have had it for 5 days now, and she doesnt seem to like anything I have tried to feed her. she grabs it and appears to be VERY interested but then drops it and wanders off about 20 minutes later. ive tried krill and shrimp. i am trying to get away with not ordering crabs, but it appears thats all she'll take? suggestions?

 

[CaptFish]

I have two right now that I have had for 2 and 3 weeks. At this point they are eating snails, hermit crabs, and decorator crabs.

Post some pics!

 

[Joe-Ceph]

I have a wild caught bimac that refused thawed scallop and even live, opened, muscles for the first three weeks I had it, but after it calmed down and settled in, it took scallop easily. Be sure to offer dead food with a feeding stick (skewer) so that the octo doesn't feel threatened by your hand.

 

[DWhatley]

We were never able to get our mercs to eat anything other than Cyclop-eeze, fiddlers or freshly killed shore shrimp until we tried our current one with a sliver (about the size of a shore shrimp in length and thickness) of thawed table shrimp. Sleazy eats this very willingly every other day. The question now is, does size and shape matter of is it the acceptance more related to what was available in the wild. LMecher is having good success with a contraption she concocted using a straw and plastic guitar string