A family from the US was shocked after acquiring an octopus to keep as a pet, only to find out she produced a small army of babies.
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“If it wasn’t obvious already, octopuses are not your everyday household pets. In fact, octopuses are not very common in Oklahoma at all,” wrote Cameron Clifford from Oklahoma City last week on his TikTok profile.
Clifford bought an adult female octopus from California for his eldest son back in October. However, Terrance laid about 50 eggs in December, which began hatching in February.
Clifford has been documenting the unusual occurrence on his TikTok page. “The amount of people invested [in this story] is much larger than I had anticipated,” he told the New York Post.
“Surprising my son with an aquarium so he can fulfill his dream of having a pet octopus,” began a post in March that has already amassed over 3.7 million views.
At that time, the family showed the challenges of setting up a home for Terrance but were delighted she quickly acclimated to her new aquarium. However, two months after getting Terrance, she laid a clutch of eggs, signaling her life was soon to end.
Octopuses of the species Octopus bimaculoides have a natural lifespan of 12 to 18 months. After a female lays her eggs, she stops eating while caring for her brood and eventually withers away and dies.
By the end of March, the Cliffords said they were told “to expect her to die within four to eight weeks.” Instead, to everyone’s surprise, Terrance and her babies thrived.
And so the family welcomed Pearl, Melinda, Jay-Sea, Sea-yonceeé, Rocket Larry, and others into the mix. Clifford told the New York Post that at one point they were able to keep about 50 babies alive for about a week.
“Unfortunately, we couldn’t save them all. Those who deal with this species regularly in controlled environments only produce about 5% of the clutch.”
In a recent post, the family shared that the babies are being housed with a local reptile scientist known affectionately as Dr. Tim. Terrance is with them and is still being hand-fed for now.
The family is preparing to care for the remaining babies but is urging aquariums to reach out to them. “I would love to take this opportunity to get these babies into professional hands since Tim and I certainly aren’t experts,” Clifford told the New York Post.
Meanwhile, they have set up a Venmo to help pay for the octopus’s care. “If at this point you’re still thinking about buying an octopus, maybe first adopt a badger and see how that goes,” joked the family to their over 380,000 TikTok followers.
This content was created with the help of AI.
