An Oklahoma family had no idea that a birthday gift for their nine-year-old son would lead to the birth of 50 octopus babies, numerous water tanks that took over half of a bathroom, and thousands of dollars on food supplies and water damage repairs.
Cameron Clifford, a 36-year-old dentist, said his son Cal had been obsessed with octopuses since the age of three.
‘Every birthday, every Christmas, every holiday, he would always say: ‘All I want is an octopus,» Clifford told the New York Times.
In October, Clifford made a call to a local aquarium store and acquired a female California two-spot octopus for Cal’s ninth birthday. They named her Terrance.
Terrance turned out to be larger than expected and soon began laying eggs. Clifford documented the journey on TikTok, where his videos amassed millions of views from 400,000 followers.
In October, Cameron Clifford, a 36-year-old dentist, made a call to a local aquarium store and acquired a female California two-spot octopus for Cal’s ninth birthday. They named her Terrance
The family had no idea that a birthday gift for their nine-year-old son would lead to the birth of 50 octopus babies, numerous water tanks that took over half of a bathroom, and thousands of dollars on food supplies and water damage repairs
Clifford(third left), a 36-year-old dentist, said his son Cal(first left) had been obsessed with octopuses since the age of three
‘Do not get a pet octopus unless you’re ready to lose sleep and your kids’ college fund simultaneously,’ he told USAToday, jokingly.
When Clifford told his son that they could order an octopus from a local aquarium store, the nine-year-old immediately burst into tears.
‘His ultimate dream, his cloud nine, the greatest thing that could ever possibly happen in one’s life had just become a possibility, and he just broke down,’ Clifford said.
‘My friends and family, of course, all, as you probably imagine, said to me, ‘Well, now you have to get it for him. You can’t just dangle that in front of him and then turn around and just flatline that dream.» the father added.
The father and son began preparing for the arrival of the pet octopus, which they named Terrence.
Clifford ordered a saltwater tank, a water cycling system and food supplies for Terrence, mostly from Facebook marketplace. He thought it would cost around $600.
When Clifford told his son that they could order an octopus from a local aquarium store, the nine-year-old immediately burst into tears
Clifford ordered a saltwater tank, a water cycling system and food supplies for Terrence, mostly from Facebook marketplace. He thought it would cost around $600
But what the family didn’t realize at first was that Terrence was actually a female, who started releasing ‘a chandelier’ of little eggs two months after it arrived.
He was told by experts that the eggs were unfertilized, and the release of eggs only signals the end of the life span of the female octopus.
Until one night in February, Clifford picked up an egg and was absolutely shocked.
‘I accidentally popped it, and this droplet comes out and spreads out these tiny tentacles and does three swim strokes across my viewpoint,’ he said.
Terrance the octopus ended up hatching a total of 50 babies, and ‘all bets went off,’ he said.
The family had to arrange 50 separated homes for the unexpected offspring, spend thousands of dollars on clams, crabs, and snails, not to mention the costs to repair the damage to the house from spilled water and a small electrical fire.
Speaking of one particularly messy incident, Clifford said: ‘I wish I wouldn’t have opened that valve that way and dumped all that dirty seawater onto my kids’ white carpet.’
Meanwhile, the desperate father started calling aquariums and research facilities and begging them to take the babies off his hands.
‘It’s a lot of work,’ he said. ‘A lot of work and emotion and money and time.’
‘I don’t know that we’ve been fully prepared for any of these challenges, but the hope is to re-home as many as we can.
‘And those that we can’t, we will figure out a way to keep them alive and be responsible. It’s not a real concrete plan, but we’re doing pretty good so far.’
The experience is overall joyful and rewarding as he said: ‘It’s been an absolutely fun experience, not just for me, but also for my kids.’
The family had to arrange 50 separated homes for the unexpected offspring, spend thousands of dollars on clams, crabs, and snails, not to mention the costs to repair the damage to the house from spilled water and a small electrical fire
Meanwhile, the desperate father started calling aquariums and research facilities and begging them to take the babies off his hands
Two months after hatching, half of the babies are still alive, an astonishingly higher survival rate than the average.
‘Every scientist I speak to is always kind of astonished by that fact that we were able to get such a high yield in a kid’s bathroom,’ he said.
And Terrence is still alive, Clifford said.
‘She’s doing good. She is just living out the rest of her life in her tank by herself. She will probably die in the next several weeks, although my assumptions of her have been wrong consistently.’
The family has become famous too, as Clifford has amassed nearly 400 thousand followers on TikTok.
‘I think there’s a lot of people out there that had this crazy pipe dream when they were a kid, and then it just kind of fizzled away as they got older,’ he said.
‘I think they also really empathize with kind of this stereotypical story of a father who decides to give his child a pet, and then, of course, turns into the father almost taking exclusive care of that pet, except to the nines in this case.’
