Family’s shock at pet octopus that gave birth to 50 babies
A FAMILY found themselves caring for 51 octopuses after they unwittingly bought a pregnant one, thinking it was male.
Cal Clifford, nine, had been obsessed with the creatures since he was two and his father, Cameron, finally acquiesced to his appeals.
Mr Clifford, a 36-year-old dentist from Oklahoma, duly bought a 60-gallon tank as a surprise for Cal’s birthday. He then bought a California two-spot octopus from a local aquarium. It came by post inside a bag of water, and Terrance became a member of the family.
Initially, the Cliffords thought Terrance was a male. Within a few weeks, they discovered they were mistaken.
The tank in Cal’s bedroom was packed with dozens of eggs.
Mr Clifford had assumed the eggs were not fertilised, but Terrance had mated before being caught by a diver.
When Mr Clifford picked one up, a blob popped out and started swimming around the tank.
“I just screamed my wife’s name,” he told The Washington Post. “That started the whole stress of it because now we felt this immense responsibility of taking care of these babies.”
In the end, 50 babies were born but the Cliffords got off lightly – a giant Pacific octopus can produce more than 50,000 eggs, according to biologist Jim Cosgrove.
Caring for Terrance’s massive brood has proved rather expensive. There has been a bill for individual homes for each of the offspring and feeding them did not come cheap, with the family spending several thousand dollars for snails, clams and crabs.
“Do not get a pet octopus unless you’re ready to lose sleep and your kids’ college fund simultaneously,” Mr Clifford told USA Today.
“Having an octopus is hard. It’s laboursome and expensive. It’s wet. It’s all of the above. So you shouldn’t do it if you’re not prepared to follow through.”