HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Hi
The latest is that #2 has been active at night and digging back in during the day. He's up starting in the wee hours until about 8am. Still haven't seen the other two.

KayedeeLove<3, I did the insulation and it's doing a good job of maintaining the heat. Thanks for that suggestion.

nothing really new, but #2 is completely covered still and #3 is in his crater still but not fully covered. #1 is dug in deep down below (about 6 inches laterally from where he started) and I can see him in a little gap in the sand through the window. Am planning to tape something against the glass ...

You ladies are fonts of wisdom! I am taking all that you said to heart. At the end of this phase (who knows how long that will be) I am either going to get them a bigger tank or find them a better home. For now, signs seem favorable for another go at moulting (adopting your spelling, LJJ :). After f...

Thanks for all the help! The saga continues. I did add a wall sticky heater but have kept the red light also. KayedeeLove<3 what are your suggestions for insulating? Since writing that they were all down I think that I disturbed them by doing too much in the tank, because they came up from the sand ...

thanks KayedeeLove<3
I think I'm going to try your suggestion with the side heater. that sounds like a good solution.

Hi
Here are some of the sounds. The best ones, of course, are happening before and after I hit record and stop. I will try for more. You have to turn the sound up high to hear it well.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/5xgz2ya6a ... unds.1.m4a

What are your experiences with molting sounds?

I'm hearing crackling and croaking among other things. Still not sure whether 3 new PPs are down for the full molt, yet, but they are down without coming up for 3 and 6 days so far.

Thank you ladies. I appreciate the support! So far I have gently relocated the tank and sprinkled some extra wet sub from the left third of the tank in the middle third. The crabs are buried in the right third of the tank. There is evidence that the last one is taking a little space from the other t...

Hi 3 new PPs (2-3 inch shells) all seem to have gone to the same corner to molt and I had not made final decisions about location of the 10 gal tank and was putting off adding the last final inches of sand/coir 5:1 due to weight of tank. It's only been a couple of days for the last one. The other tw...

you could also soak up water with a paper towel or absorbent dishtowel

Re: how much I read
Let's just say I didn't get a lot of stuff on my To Do list done that day.

I skipped over some of the experiments they did.

LadyJinglyJones, thanks for your thoughtful reply. The research I cited was in a pdf at the bottom of the page my link goes to (see above). The title of the work is "On the ecology of Coenobita clypeatus in Curaçao with reference to reproduction, water economy and osmoregulation in terrestrial hermi...

thanks for that gotbutterflies!

Hi I've been reading some research on PPs (see pdf at bottom of page at this URL) http://repository.naturalis.nl/record/506107 It seems that in the wild PPs may not ever choose to submerge themselves, either totally or partially, in water. Also, they apparently spend a lot of time and energy working...

Hi aussiedude this is just the kind of nerdy conversation I was hoping for :) The paper I linked to originally had the formula for the byproducts of the vitamin c reaction with chloramines, I think. My understanding is that some, but not all, of the dechlorinators also help with heavy metals. Which ...