HCA: Hermit Crab Association

kuza wrote:oh really? are they only 1 mm or 1-2 mm? I would love pictures and to somehow buy some from you.

I'll pm you with a picture i'd be happy to just send them off to you, shipping will only be like... 2$?

yay, that would be great, thanks. Any shells between 1-3 mm would be perfect but I'll settle for all 1mm if that's what you've got. I can paypal you the cost of shipping when you know how much you need but make sure to ship first so I don't short change you if it ends up costing more

Most of them are closer to 2mm, some are bigger (up to 4mm) but some are around 1mm. It really varies I sent you a pic so let me know if they look alright

Just replied, they look great

so my last jar of zoea are almost all megalopa now, I'm not goign to add them into the betta tank, I'm going back to the jars and splitting them up into 4 jars again. I just got another 10 gallon air pump to split up the 4 zoea jars (for the eggs about to drop this weekend) and the megalopa jars. I'm also not sure I'm going to use sand this time, maybe just add a few shells in each jar and that's it. I'll just keep the sand for the transition tank.

So much learning, it's a good thing I keep so many zoea or I'd be down to nothing now. I think at current count I have maybe 50 megalopa now, maybe more, maybe less.

Hows it going there today?

Not as bad as I thought it would be. I just spent the last half hour removing all the shells from the betta tank so I can remove a bunch of sand and the dead babies. Then I'm going to re-arrange it so the sand is just a bit in the middle and put in way less shells for now. I'm still not sure if I should split them up into jars again, they ate each other both when separated and when together... so I'm not sure how to stop it. I'm making room in my 29 gallon outside tank for the new eggs that will drop any day now, so I need room for 3-4 jars.

So for the current clutch I'm now down to 1 jar now with about 12 megalopa and 12 zoea left, all looking strong. Then in the betta tank there's at least 20-30 megalopa that I see either swimming, eating, crawling along the sand or doing that thing where they just grab the sand by their arms and float with their tail up towards the sky. They are so weird. I took some good video that I'll post later tonight if I finish doing this water change any time soon. I guess there's a potential for around 50 megalopa to make it into the real transition tank I'm still working on.

The big issue in the betta tank is where they like to pile up in groups and end up attacking each other constantly. Sometimes I'll see 1 crab eating another crab while he's being eaten by a 3rd crab. So I lose 2 crabs in 1 shot

I tried to break up a couple fights and my wife got all like "don't do that" and I'm like, I sure can, I'm their parent! To fix this I'm trying to mess with the sand layout to create more of 2 sections to the tank with the water flow.

when i broke up a few fights pieces went this way & bits that way
I felt hopeless watching mine eat each other.
What are the laws regarding incoming mail there? Specifically fish food

They are pretty bad, I found out about a new marine store in town that I'm going to check on tomorrow, if they don't have anything like what you showed me then maybe we can attempt to have you send me some of your stuff and if it doesn't make it, no big deal. I can pay you ahead of time and take the risk myself.

I was trying to think up a way to separate them into tiny cups without having to do manual water changes on that many little things AND keep the oxygenation levels up AND keep them heated.

What about taking a large, long, shallow storage bin (like an underbed storage box) and line it with small plastic cups. Fill all the cups to the brim with the saltwater, and fill the bin they are in with several inches of water so the cups are almost but not completely submerged.

Overtop the cups run tubing (airline or aquarium tubing, sold at hardware stores) with at least one tiny hole punched into the tube directly over each cup. Hook the tubing up to a very small and slow filter that sits inside the bin.

The water will flow from the bin into the cups, spill slowly over the edge of the cup, and get returned to the bin. If the water flow is kept slow enough then the megalopa wouldn't be able to get over the rim of the cup. You could put an additional bubbler for oxygenation and a heater in the bin near the filter. Water changes could be performed on the bin rather than the cups. The speed of flow into the cups could be controlled by the size or amount of holes that go into the cups. Depending on the size of the bin and the cups, you could have several dozen individual grow-out bowls.

When it's time for land, add cups of substrate between the cups of water, and connect with strips of something climable.

(Working theory anyway.... Since it seems that the hardest part of all of this is keeping them from eating each other! Trying to figure out an easy way of doing this for next month. )

It might be worth a shot but I think the megalopa will get over the edge into the next bin, these guys are crazy fast and they don't look where they are going. It's got to be a mesh/screen solution. I've seen some in-tank jails for aggressive fish at the store with a mesh around a plastic casing that suction cups to the side. But it was too big to use a bunch of them but it was the right idea.

I'm way too tired tonight to post video's so I'll do it in the morning, tonight's changes and fixing took way too long and I'm super tired. Going to eat and down a quick beer before I go to bed.

So the betta tank was a complete failure. I think all but a dozen died in it. I have them all back in jars now and after a better head count I have roughly 25-30 megalopa left and a dozen zoea. However some of the megalopa taken out of the betta tank look a bit sickly. Every loss is tough to take when I can see their little eyes, legs, claws and tail fin so clearly. All the ones that died were missing the tail area, so that is confirmed what NAT said about them going after the soft belly/tail area first.

With the next batch of eggs as it gets to the point where they start to morph into megalopa I'm going to separate them into 6 jars minimum. Unless we can all figure out a solution to separate them into smaller cup size containers and just separate a hundred if I have too.

I am back from London, can only do a fast look into LHC forum...

Did I understand it right, that you put in sand into the jars or pool transition tank?

Germs, bacteria and stuff will be stored in the sand. My advice: Keep all water clean. Only shells. Easier to clean.


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Curlz wrote:I am back from London, can only do a fast look into LHC forum...

Did I understand it right, that you put in sand into the jars or pool transition tank?

Germs, bacteria and stuff will be stored in the sand. My advice: Keep all water clean. Only shells. Easier to clean.


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Ya I tried to use a small betta fish tank to help with feeding because the jars are so small it's hard to work with them for feeding and cleaning. And with the shells it's tough to do a full jar switch. But it failed, maybe I shouldn't have put the sand but even without the flow of water wasn't very good. I'm down to maybe 12-15 megalopa now and they are all back into jars.

I use living phytoplankton. But only a little bit. And not every day. It clouds the water, but it is not bad. Some marine shimp breeders are using really cloudy green phytoplankton water, with success.
In the ocean there is plankton too. Zoo and phyto plankton. So I thiunk it can't be wrong. But I do not know how much I have to put in. So I choose to put in only 1-2 drops every 2 day.


In my opinion and with adviced from the marine breeders I do not use sand at any time. Because it holds the bacteria and stuff. And you can't clean the floor.

Food like krill or mysis has to be changes several times a day. We had to work, so we changed it in the morning and after work. Sometime s short time before going tp bed.
The frozen food has to be fresh and good. And it has to be washed before use.


*sigh* it is a complicated experiment. Even if we try to do it like the successfull try, it does not work a second time.
my only left megalop died while I was in holiday.
Have to wait for the next try...

Good luck to the left ones!