Octopi mating???

[fishguy194]

I have 2 octopi and decided to live life on the edge, of the aquarium. HAHAHA. Anyway, I was wondering if anybody has seen octopi mate. I put my smaller one which I think is a female in a tank with a larger one, which I cannot sex. The larger one was in a critter keeper to make sure so fist fights occured. When the smaller one saw the bigger one it went up to the cage, faded in color and sat there. The larger one went back and forth across the cage watching the smaller one. When I finally got the nerve, and net, and cup, and bat if necessary, I let the larger one out. He came over and engulfed the smaller one's head under its own and sat on top of it. Then the smaller one turned upside down, and matched the smaller one mouth for mouth and suction cup to suction cup and embraced on the bottom of the aquarium for about five minutes. I sat and watched, nervously until I noticed the smaller one trying to break away. At this time I intervened and they separated. Unscathed. I put the smaller one in the kritter keeper to see if more rituals or something would happen. So far, they are both eating well in each other's company, but I won't let them roam together without strict supervision. Could somebody let me know if this was a superiority battle? Mating or courting? Or just being friendly?

 

[fishgk]

one way to tell if you have octopuses of the same sex or not is to look at their arms. if either have larger suckers on, i think it may be the 5th arm, then it is male. uniform suckers imply females...in most cases anyway. usually females are larger. the female will watch the male, which will usually change body pattern. usually the third arm is modified in males, and will be stretched out towards the female. if the female accepts she will allow him to deposit sperm into her mantle cavity. if this is what was happening, you may see the female lay eggs anytime from now up to a few weeks from now. do you have your male and female seperated now? it is important, because after the female lays her eggs she will waste away to nothing so that her cannabilistic instinct does not harm her babies once they are hatched. the male, however, will not die so he may eat the babies. what kind of octopuses do you have? that is also important to know, because mating patterns vary a bit between species. this is what i know in general of octopuses.

 

[fishguy194]

Well, so far so good. At one point my other employees told me that they were actually switching cages at will. While one would go inside the kritter keeper, the other would wander out. Now they are definetely separated. I made sure of that. I do not see any difference in suckers on the smaller one, but on the larger one the suckers vary greatly at certain parts. They only problem is it looks like the animal may just be regenerating arms. As for species... hahaha, you are going to kill me. Thaumoctopus mimicus, the mimic.

 

[fishgk]

eeeeek!! haha, well, i'll have to think about that one!! i probably know the least about mimics!