- Cameron Clifford, a 36-year-old dentist, bought his son Cal a female octopus for his ninth birthday.
- The octopuses that arrived were larger than expected, and in the end they hatched a total of 50 babies.
- The family spent more than $3,000 on food supplies and water damage repairs.
An Oklahoma family's birthday gift for their 9-year-old son turned into the birth of 50 baby octopuses, numerous aquariums that took up half the bathroom, and thousands of dollars in food supplies and water damage repairs. I never thought it would be. .
Cameron Clifford, a 36-year-old dentist, said his son Cal has been obsessed with octopuses since he was three years old.
“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 called a local aquarium store and purchased a female two-spot octopus from California for Cal's ninth birthday. They named her Terrence.
Terence turned out to be larger than expected and immediately began laying eggs. Clifford documented his journey on his TikTok, and his videos garnered millions of views from his 400,000 followers.
“Don't make an octopus your pet unless you're willing to lose your sleep and your child's college funds at the same time,” he jokingly told USAToday.
When Clifford told her son he could order octopus at the local aquarium store, the 9-year-old immediately burst into tears.
“His ultimate dream, his cloud nine, the biggest thing that could ever happen in his life had just become possible, and he just broke down in tears,” Clifford said.
“Of course, all my friends and family, as you can probably imagine, told me, 'Come on, you've got to get it for him. Just dangle it in front of him. , you can't look back and flatten that dream,” the father added.
Father and son are preparing to adopt a pet octopus they named Terrence.
Clifford ordered Terence's saltwater tank, water circulation system and groceries, mostly from Facebook Marketplace. He thought it would cost about $600.
However, what the family didn't realize at first was that Terence was actually a female and began releasing “chandeliers” of tiny eggs two months after she arrived.
Experts told her the eggs were unfertilized and their release only signaled the end of the female octopus' lifespan.
One night in February, Clifford picked up the egg and was shocked.
“I accidentally broke it open, and this droplet came out and spread out these little tentacles and swam across my vantage point three times,” he said.
Terence the octopus eventually hatched a total of 50 babies, and “all bets were off,” he said.
The family had to arrange 50 separate homes for their unexpected offspring, spending thousands of dollars on clams, crabs, and snails, not to mention damage to the home from water leaks and small electrical fires. It was also costly to repair.
Of a particularly troubling incident, Clifford said: “I wish I hadn't opened the valve like that and dumped all the dirty seawater all over the kids' white carpet.”
Meanwhile, desperate fathers began calling aquariums and research facilities, begging them to take their babies from their hands.
“It's a lot of work,” he said. “It takes a lot of effort, emotion, money and time.”
“I don't know if we are fully prepared for these challenges, but we want as many people as possible to return home.
“And for those who can't do that, we'll figure out a way to keep them alive and accountable. It's not a concrete plan, but we're doing pretty well so far.”
The whole experience was fun and rewarding, he said, “and it was a really fun experience not only for me but for the kids as well.”
Two months after hatching, half of the babies are still alive, a surprisingly higher than average survival rate.
“Every scientist I talk to is always surprised by the fact that we were able to get such high yields in children's toilets,” he says.
And Terrence is still alive, Clifford said.
“She's fine. She's just going to live out the rest of her life alone in the tank. She'll probably die within the next few weeks, but my assumptions about her have been consistently wrong. .”
The family has also become famous as Clifford has amassed around 400,000 followers on TikTok.
“I think there are a lot of people who had crazy dreams like this when they were kids, but as they grew older, it went away,” he said.
“They also talked about the kind of typical story of a father who decides to give his child a pet and then naturally becomes the father who takes almost exclusive care of that pet. “I think it's very empathetic, but in this case it was just a 9-year-old.” ”
