Octopus Care
 

I just acquired an octopus from a fairly local fish store. It was aqua cultured so I am hoping that its survival rate is a little better than a wild caught animal.

I have researched octopus care a lot for several years and have the animal currently in only a ten gallon tank. The tank I ordered for it has not come in, it is a 30 gallon long tank, but the animal is small and his new tank should be here early part of next week.

My question involves the feeding of the octopus. He currently is not very active except at night. In his tank I have a sand substrate, a tempature of 72 Degrees F, and a salinity of 1.020. I have read a slightly lower salinity and tempature does well for these animals.

My assumption is it is best to feed them at night time. I dont have any lighting on the octo tank since it seems like lighting just aggitates him, and really is not neccessary. My question is this - are my water paremeters ok - the current filtration is a Whisper 40 with a 200 gallon per hour flow rate. Also I have a large Tetra Tek Deep Water Air Pump flooding the tank with dissolved oxygen - I hear that is of importance as well. To allow him to hide I inserted a clay pot that he loves.

What is the best food for these animals - goldfish, ghost shrimp, crayfish anything else??

Your octo needs full ocean salinity around sg 1.026.

Aquacultured octopuses are usually bimacs. Here is a link to a
[url=www.tonmo.com/cephcare/BimacCareSheet.php]Bimac Care Sheet[/URL]

A thirty gallons is a bit small for this species. Fifty gallons would be better. Of more concern is the three months or so it will take your new tank to cycle. The octo will have grown a lot by that time.

As for feeding, no goldfish - feed small hermit crabs, thawed frozen shrimp, small snails - see the Care Sheet.

Well hopefully the tank wont need to cycle. I have a 65 gallon reef tank I was planning on using for the water or at least a large percentage of the water in the octo's new tank. That way he will have fully cycled water.

a skimmer is very important

stay away from goldfish they are usualy treated with copper at the holding tanks copper kills octos