Nautilus

[Gluestick]

There is an auction on ebay for a Chambered Nautilus in the Chicagoland area. I'm not planning on bidding, but I just wanted to know if anyone here has ever kept one and how hard they are to take care of. How big do they get? What do you feed them?

[saltygeek]

You might want to post this in the Cephalapods forum up above. I don't know if the folks in there watch this forum much or not.

[mbbuna]

they come from deep,cold waters and dont live very long

[JmLee]

Im from california central coast ( cold water ) we supposely have them around here. I bet if you had a cold water tank you could keep one.

[acro-wrasse]

because of their special needs (Large, cold, dark tank) no one except public aquariums is successful with them. They will live for a while in a warm reef tank, but a very short life is a given under those conditions.

I kept one for 6 months that my LFS gave me. They got it from a lost shipment and refused to sell it. It lived 4 months in my 10 gallon refugium. I kept the lights off, but the warm water temp was a killer. I would not encourage anyone to get one.

[JmLee]

like i said before.... any one willing to set up a proper tank will prob have sucess with them.

[iCam]

Originally posted by JmLee
like i said before.... any one willing to set up a proper tank will prob have sucess with them.

Keep in mind how deep down they are found during the day in the wild, and the pressure that far down.

That can't be recreated in any way in a home aquarium.

[JmLee]

i live like just 15 miles from the montereybay aquarium and they keep nautilus in some about 200 gall display tank

[Reefcherie]

Nautilus are classified w/n the Cephalopod group. [moved]

[Opcn]

Nautiloids stay so deep in order to get food and avoid being eaten, they do not require it, infact they have very sophisticated means of equalisinf presure, you can drag one up from the depths at speeds that litterally pop bony fishes and they suffer no ill effects, assuming its dont at night or lateon an overcast day, they arent too fond of light from what I gather.

[JmLee]

thanks opcn.

[Brock Fluharty]

*****This is not a commercial Post*****

I can get them from my wholesaler for about $30, but I heard that they collect them in ways that they shouldn't (don't ask me how...), and that they are very short lived in an aquarium. They need temps of around 60*F I think, and a 200 gallon + tank. It would need to be a rectangle, but the opposite of most tanks. It would need to be taller than wide or long. They also are not very interactive, and...boring. All they do is hover around all day. They aren't as interactive as an octopus, and we have already accomplished them. There are certain things that even man need not accomplish...

[JmLee]

yeah ive seen them at the aquarium and they ARE pretty boring. Just kinda float around. They are for sure cold water animals, just like here in the monterey bay =)

[goblinsharkman]

We keep em here at the National Zoo. They are not to finiky. Need cooled water lik 20C and we use a blue light over the tank. The tank is probably about 200 gallons and fairly deep. we feed em thawed frozen shrimp. We have about 11 of them in the tank. They arent too active but a cool animal nontheless.

[DHyslop]

I think one of the big problems with nautilus is the ones that find their way into home aquariums aren't too healthy. At every step of the way--collector, distributor, fish shop--the person in charge knows and cares little about proper conditions. As a result its doubtful that you'll find a healthy one.

Public aquariums can buy specimens from the NRCC which may account for their success.

Dan

[jlawson382]

If my reading is correct, the biggest problem with keeping a Nautilus in private aquaria comes from their daily movement - read about how the Waikiki Aquarium handles their tanks.

" In 1984, we used sonic transmitters to track living Nautilus belauensis in Palau, Micronesia, in order to learn more about its daily movements. We discovered that Nautilus moves as deep as 467 meters (1541 ft.) during the day, and at dusk ascends to depths as shallow as 85 meters (280 ft.). Temperatures at these depths ranged from 8º C to 24º C (46º to 75º F)."


Oh yeah... first post.