live food??

[gothicgirl]

i think freshwater live is too fatty for salt water cephs. what do live food do you feed your cephs?

 

[bradleym]

Depends on the ceph. And the owner. And the availability. You're gonna have to narrow it down for a real answer. Anything from hermit or fiddler crabs to store bought shrimp to mysis or baby brine shrimp to sw acclimated mollies to... like I said.

 

[Raggamuffin]

ask around your various fish stores that carry live rock, ask them to save the rock and gorilla crabs, mantis shrimp, and other "baddies" that hitch a ride in.

 

[mx838]

I get the like said above bad stuff from the lfs and I go to a local distributor for lfs fish and get stuff from them that is bad. I have an advantage I can go to the ocean only 20 minutes away and can collect a few hundred mysis shrimp and crabs when I need to only think is that its a short season here in maine.

 

[Koshmar]

ask around your various fish stores that carry live rock, ask them to save the rock and gorilla crabs, mantis shrimp, and other "baddies" that hitch a ride in.

If you do throw in a mantis shrimp, make sure it's less than 1-2 inches or so to prevent injury to the ceph, unless you have a large octo. Remember a stab from the dactyl can result in an infection, it does'nt have to kill the ceph outright. I would actually advise against it and I love cuttles and stomatopods equally so no bias here. Ive kept both.

 

[Lmecher]

I feed fiddler crabs, I disable the large claw on the males, just in case it may hurt my octopus. I go to the Asian market and buy blue crabs (my octopus is very large and can handle a 5-6 inch crab) also disable the claws. I did purchase assorted crabs from a vendor but I received many decorator crabs which went after my corals, I ended up giving many away. Some people feed shore shrimp but after ordering them once and seeing the very low mortality, never ordered them again.

 

[Octoman]

I offer live blue crabs, green crabs, and spider crabs when I can get my hands on them. For a smaller octo, I can collect plenty of asian shore crabs nearby.

 

[Thales]

i think freshwater live is too fatty for salt water cephs. what do live food do you feed your cephs?

Freshwater fish have a very different profile than saltwater fish, but, according to a Rob Toonen article, FW crustaceans are pretty close. I have raised and kept S. bandensis completely on FW ghost shrimp.

 

[andrewkw]

I feed my octo about 40% live fiddler crabs and 60% uncooked table shrimp. This is just a guestimate. If he's around and willing I'll feed him the uncooked shrimp on a stick and he gladly takes it, but if he's deep in the rock and I don't have time to wait him out I'll just throw in some fiddler crabs. I don't disable the claw. He can take care of himself.

 

[deathy17]

how often do you feed?