HCA: Hermit Crab Association

My son wanted to get me hermit crabs for mother's day this year. Random but we went and got them anyway. I used to have them as a kid so thought it would be a great idea. We got blocks of coco earth substrate to reconstitute for half the tank... recently crickets have appeared in the tank. We have never given them crickets. They're clearly breeding in the tank. Aside from picking each cricket off and killing it, or completely redoing all the substrate in the tank is there any other way to handle the crickets without harming the crabs. One crab is currently molting so I wanna avoid digging the substrate out until he re emerges on his own. Any ideas?

Yeah, once they start making babies they are a pain to get rid of, at least the feeder type of crickets are. I had some strays get away from my geckos and scorpions and they lived in my crab tank upstairs for a couple of years, making babies in the moist substrate and moss.

There are DIY live traps that use bottles with food inside that would be safe to try around the crabs. For babies (called pinheads) a bendable straw leading into the water dish can be a plank to death. Mine eventually snuffed themsleves out by either being caught and eaten by the crabs or by drowning themselves but it took awhile.

Female crickets have a straight stick out of their bum, that's their ovipositor for laying eggs. Even if you focus on killing just those it can stop the reproduction cycle. Theyre bigger than the boys and make easier targets, too. Feeding tongs for reptiles are great for just getting in there and snapping them up, and they won't go to waste, the crabs will eat them!