octo out of bag

[KDS]

Hi, Its me again. My octopus is out of its bag!!!!! I think it is because she no longer has an egg to care for. She is behind the filter and is a nice normal color red (not really dark, but not white). She ate once for my mom while we were on vacation, but when I got home and fed her she blew away the shrimp. There are two other fish in the tank (maroon clown and damsel), should I put them in plastic boxes inside the tank ( I don't have another tank) so maybe my octo would feel more comfortable and go find a cave (for some odd reason she likes the feel of plastic). Any advise or words of encouragement are welcome.
KDS

[Mizu]

if your Octo has laid and cared for eggs its a goner
They only live long enough to lay eggs then they stop eating and die.
Nothing you can do about it.

[KDS]

That's what I thought, but the egg hatched three weeks ago. She is still activte and is now eating some and otherwise appears healthy. I'm new to cephalopods; is this normal behavior for a mommy octo?
Also according to Hanlon and Messenger (Cephalopod Behavior), some species of octopi breed and rear mature eggs several times.
KDS

[Mizu]

Maybe it was not HER egg

[Mizu]

ohh can I have link to that
I have never heard of any octo that can have more than one cluthc eggs

[bchristie]

There have been a couple of instances where GPO's (Giant Pacific Octopods, Enteroctopus dofleini) have lived to produce two clutches of eggs, but these are anomalies in keeping with Godels theorem that in any complex mathematical or biological system there are exceptions to the norm that do not neccesarily invalidate the "rules". But for the most part, one can expect the overwhelming majority of cephs to adhere to their defined semelparitous lifestyle, with such occurances being extremely rare.

......but nonetheless it has happened

[bchristie]

Oh and it is a very good book, a must read for ceph-heads:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/052...Fencoding=UTF8