[Octopus]: Wink - Octopus Digueti

[QueenB]

The fiddler tank is one of those large pet carriers. It has a vented top with an access door. It snaps into place.

This is a Photo for reference to the fiddler tank only. Remember the barnacle is no longer in the 4g tank. It's in a 4-5G gallon small tank cycling with the Seashells I bought to put in the Octopus main tank.

 

[QueenB]

This tank is bigger then the 4G IM tank





Very old Clam shell I have had for years. it has Blue Xenia growing on it. I want to stick this in there so bad but I'm worried the Xenia will sting her.

 

[QueenB]

I've been putting shrimp on the plastic ice cube with a zip tie and handing it to her, and she holds onto the cube after eating the shrimp until I give her her next piece on a skewer. She has been playing tug of war with either the ice cube and zip tie or the skewer.

I'm so extremely happy for this small bit of interaction with her.

 

[QueenB]

Sat was the last time she ate until today. She is refusing shrimp and I tried to give her a fasting day or 2 and hoped she would take a piece if I didn't offer the fiddlers. I tried every day to give her a piece of shrimp but she keeps refusing it and blowing it out of her den. I gave in today and fed her a fiddler, and she did that quick grab with 3 arms this time and back into her den.

Sara from Sachs sent a super small fiddler and I gave her that as a 2nd but smaller feeding to see if she was still hungry and yup she was. She is still eating it as I'm typing this out.

She still doesn't come out of her den and I pulled out that shrimp and put it in the clown tank. My Gonipora and toadstool was dying off in the clown tank (clowns trying to host it and the Gonipora wants nothing to do with them). So I placed them on the bottom of the tank away from her den so they could regenerate untill I can either get rid of them or possibly start up just a coral tank with a couple if smaller fish like a goby or blennies.

 

[QueenB]

Well I did a water change today and decided to take out the IM skimmer I have been having problems with and put the factory one back in.



The IM skimmer skims good when its at the right level and tweaked just right. But the bracket you need to hang it is absolutely useless. It's a pain in the rear when your doing weekly maintenance and having to constantly tweak & adjust the height of it to get it just right again. But the RSM Factory one skims WAY better just adjust the air nozzle and that's it. Although I don't get to use the Media Basket like I want to. It tends to run a little warmer then the IM, so I'm watching over the temp of the tank for the next week to see just how hot it gets. I stuck on a new RSM 130 factory fan in the wall of the back sump to help with it. I've had a bad experience with the Tunze skimmers. I had one explode water all over my living room floor. No idea what happened but it spurted water out the top so fast it blew the collection cup right off and water went everywhere. I was furious because I had just had new rugging put down. I had steam coming out my ears. It smelled for over a week. I had a professional come and clean it twice.

I also added a surface skimmer cup that is designed for the 130. Hope it helps with that oily look to the top of my water. Drives me nuts that my water is so crystal clear other then the top oil slick.

Since I can't use the media basket with the stock skimmer, I stuck in 2 more carbon in zip bags on the top of the skimmer where it flows over into the pump area that pushes it back in the tank. Kind of hard to explain, but they get water flow through them,a sponge to reduce bubbles, then back through a bag of ceramic cylinders, another sponge on top of that then the return pump. I placed a coarse sponge above the skimmer pump so she can't slide down in there. I use the white one for when I leave the house or go to bed and it prevents her from getting through the vent. Kind of like a coarse dam door. I like to open the filtration up as much as I can and I tend to stir up the substrate a lot since I can't keep many critters in there to do it for me. When I take the white coarse sponge out and stir it up you can see her shedded suckers, tiny debris, and all the tiny floaties. And I stir mine up everyday. If anyone comes across a filter sock design for the RSM 130 with the factory skimmer please send me the design, seller, DIY ect...

I have also added more LR and adjusted the LR onto her main piece so its more full. It gives kind of a Shelf design with lots of holes and crevasses for her to play in when she finally gets brave enough to come out. I really love the way it looks now. I am trying to be careful cause I want the water flow to be able to get all the debris falling out of her den and not have any areas that stuff is getting collected and not filtered out. So I tend to do a daily DUSTING if you will. lol

I just moved the cabbages to the ledges on the bottom away from her den. I thought there were to clustered up there. The Gonipora is so happy now that there are no clowns trying to host it. It was dying off and is now starting to come out and hopefully regenerate.

Anyway here are some photos. Please ignore the blankets on the windows. I get such awful glares on the glass when I try to photo so I cover the windows when its bad.

Right Side




Front Side ( Is it me or is this starting to look like a circus side show? All the pretty colors!)




Left Side




New trick to get her to eat shrimp. She gets mad cause it won't move so easily to blow it away. Then she grabs the zip tie skewered shrimp and starts to eat it after a while. She does eat most of it and finally a tiny bit is left and she plays with the zip tie or ring and then releases it when shes done.




Notice the rock piece that is under her den now? I pulled it from one of my other tanks, and I forget what its called, but its completely covered in dark purple coraline algae. The darkest and best piece I have. Well she must really like it cause when I was adjusting her den and wiggling the bigger piece to make sure it wouldn't just fall over in the back, she had 3 arms down exploring it. It kind of reminds me of the Popcorn Rock I used to get. It has bubbles all over it like the top of a piece of popcorn.

I've been searching Craigslist lately and checking my LFS for more pieces with caves or to make ledges with. When she finally passes, I want to drill the pieces in there now and make it all one piece and not have to worry about anything crumbling on her or a bigger octo if I get one.

So what do you think of the formation? I didn't want it to look like I just threw it in there, and the big main piece I have allows those others to attach like ledges. I was getting so frustrated cause I hate aquascaping, and after a water change and cleaning I decided to play with it while she had a fiddler in the corner to see what i could come up with. I'm satisfied. I just hope she is to.

FYI she ate 2 fiddlers again today. I'm thinking it's because of their size. The ones I have been ordering are female and they are babies still not like the full size adults. Their almost half the size of an adult. I'm going to order 10 adults and 10 small ones my next order. I had an adult one, but it was too big to get inside her den door, and she was trying to hard while eating it to get it inside. There was pieces all over my tank. She really shredded that one. I'm still trying to find a tiny basketball net to mount in her tank for when she spits. ( "Nothing but net" ) I love watching her and catching them as she spits. Sometimes they are whole, but the majority of them look like confetti.

 

[QueenB]

a lot fuller compared to

 

[QueenB]

She hasn't eaten anything for a couple of days. I tried shrimp, fiddlers, and scallop again. But she refuses everything. I can only see her eye, and 2 arms, and she has seems to have changed color. She is more of a dark grey now instead of brown with the blue hue to her. I know she is an adult, but am hoping to have a little longer with her. I checked for eggs and still nothing.

 

[QueenB]

She took shrimp today! Woohoo! I got her partway out of her den this time for it and she's a dark Greyish brown. She gets dark when she sees me coming kind of like a warning, but happily took the tiny piece of shrimp and tickles the fingers. I know she is probably starting senescence (dying off), but she's still my sweetheart.

No brooding since I haven't seen any eggs.

She also has a new tank mate that doesn't bother her. I bought a 1/2" - 1" Striped damsel to see if I could get some activity out of her with a live tank mate. Her arms go crazy when it goes near her den and the reaction of the damsel when it discovered wink was priceless. The Damsel started towards the den finding all the holes and crevasses in that rock formation, and an arm came out and flicked her away. That fish swam so fast like "Holy Crap what was that!"

Thankfully No bites, but she has only been playing touch or tickle and go. I hand feed the fiddlers live, but give her the tiny shrimp on a skewer.

Trying to get photos of her coloring, but its so hard.

 

[DWhatley]

I feel strongly about "No Fish" with an octopus and damsels are the highest on the NO list. Damsels tend to be territorial and aggressive and will likely start picking on the octopus.

 

[QueenB]

Sometimes I think there is too much room for her.



Tank mate clean up buddy for excess shrimp pieces and to keep her company. I can't find a yellow tail damsel.



You can barely see her, but her color is changing to a greyish brown. I can see it and notice it because I see her daily and am noticing small changes. Eating habits, color changing, ect.

 

[QueenB]

Hmm ok no damsel.. I'll be taking it back to the store.. I don't want it picking on my snowflake picaso's

 

[QueenB]

Damsel gone 2 small pieces of shrimp and 2 fiddlers so far today.

 

[QueenB]

I did a water change again, moved some rock pieces around, and stirred up the substrate. She is now sitting in the front of her den in a dark brown/grey color. (That don't come near me type of look that could kill almost devilish if she had a mustache and horns) But she's happily taking pieces of shrimp from me from the skewer and fiddlers from hand.

I'm never satisfied with my filtration so I tend to really stir the substrate up since there's not a lot of snails, crabs, ect.. to feed on the excess shrimp/crab debris that she doesn't eat. Some of the pieces she blows out are so tiny I can't even get them with the net. She's leaving the fiddlers almost completely intact. She grabs them, stuns them, and then liquefies them from the back end of their shells. (Butt area) and then blows out the whole fiddler when she's finished. I haven't had to chase down fiddler legs or claws for a while AND I'M NOT COMPLAINING!

I've been leaving the red top on during feeding. I lift it to reach in and give her food and then just sit and watch her munch on it and wait with the net. I wait about 20-30 min in between the tiny pieces of shrimp to make sure she has eaten the whole piece. If I rush her she spits out the one she was munching on to grab the new piece.

I took the damsel back the other day and the looks I got from the store people was hilarious. They thought she would have eaten it until I showed them the pictures of her and they realized she's a dwarf. I traded the damsel in for a shell for her to play with. I couldn't find my receipt but still had the yellow paper with the skew # on it. They pretty much know who I am when I go in to stock up on things with the Zoo I have at home. They adore my Toy Yorkie and Chocolate Min Pins.



We recently rescued another Full size Yorkie that was kept outside in a cage her whole life as a Puppy Mill Breeder. (5-10 yrs old) She's so sweet, but has 2 serious Luxating Patella's. But we baby her and spoil her.



Fiddler time! I LOVE HER EYES!

 

[DWhatley]

I think it is the octopus eyes that enamor a lot of us. I keep trying to capture the feeling in a photograph but only come close in video.

Continuing to eat is always a GOOD sign.

Often keepers remark on how an octopus likes to "play" or "interact" during a cleaning session (one keeper got in the habit of moving his octopus to a critter keeper to clean because it interfered so much). My own opinion is that, at least initially, they don't like the disruption and are trying to get you to leave. I don't think they appreciate it that the "room smells better" after a water exchange.

FYI, many of us keep other animals so we started a thread in the Ceph Heads forum to be able to freely post our whole zoo stories and pictures . We have a lot of dogs, cats and then some interesting fish, herps and birds.

Edit: Looking up the link to that thread made me go through it as I have not browsed it in awhile. Lots of smiles, some sad for animals and members no longer with us. I was impressed with the variety of critters that going through the thread displays.

 

[QueenB]

OOO that's a great thread! I'm gonna have to go photo shopping through my HD and find my best ones to share. I just hope that blog has enough room for me to post all our babies. lol