Octopuses are fascinating creatures. They’re lovely and clever, and since they’ll dwell in an aquarium, they appear like they’d be low-maintenance pets.
Clever Companions
Octopuses are clever creatures that wish to discover their atmosphere and sometimes work together with their human keepers.
Gainesville, Georgia, resident Denise Whatley, who has had 33 octopuses since 2006, teaches them that if they arrive to her hand within the tank, they will get consideration. Watch her eight-month-old octopus named Cassy go to her on this 2011 video:
“The house-kept species typically appear to get pleasure from a brief petting session in the event that they acclimate to people,” she stated. “Nevertheless, I attempt to be aware that petting could also be extra like a cat scratching an itch than any type of affection. Then again, they do know people and work together in another way with totally different folks.”
Rose Blanco-Chamberland maintained two saltwater aquariums earlier than she added a bimaculoides (aka a California two-spot octopus) named Cthulhu to the combination.
She was impressed by how sensible the octopus was and offered toys to entertain him. Cthulhu loved chasing toys round his tank and had fairly an affinity for zip ties.
“One among his favourite issues was once I would put dwell meals in a child meals jar, screw on the lid, after which drop it into his tank,” she stated. “He must work out methods to open the jar and that was unbelievable to observe.”
Care Necessities
Whereas interacting with an octopus will be enjoyable and interesting, these creatures have specialised wants that require time, house, and cash. The tank (and the continuing meals provide) is prone to be much more pricey than the octopus, which may value anyplace from $20 to $1,000, relying on the kind and the place you get it. (Be aware: By no means purchase a blue-ringed octopus. It is so poisonous that even its sneeze may kill you.)
Whatley says the animals want not less than a 55-gallon aquarium with a second massive tank to carry filtration tools. Others say 70 gallons is the minimal dimension for a softball-sized octopus and that you must go for a protracted and low type over a tall one because it greatest replicates the octopus’s ocean-floor dwelling. A sturdy lid is a requirement, too, as octopuses have a fame for being gifted escape artists. They’ll squeeze by way of impossibly small areas.
Feeding an octopus will also be difficult and costly. Your common pet retailer does not carry octopus meals. Octopuses will hunt and kill something their dimension or smaller; they will conceal from something bigger. They need (and wish) to eat dwell prey corresponding to grass shrimp, crayfish, and fiddler crabs, all of which you have to hold in a second tank.
“Octopus are hunters so it’s actually necessary to feed them dwell meals. I had a holding tank in our again bed room the place I’d hold his meals and I usually dropped two or three dwell critters in there a day for him,” Blanco-Chamberland stated. “I additionally did have frozen krill however solely fed him that if I occurred to expire of dwell stuff. He did not actually get pleasure from it.”