HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Hey!
So I read in the beginners material that crabs needs to be able to submerge in the water and realize I was doing that wrong. Now I am making corrections and was wondering if it's the fresh water or the salt water they like to submerge in? I only have a ten gallon tank so having two big water areas will eat up a lot of real estate!
Thx!
Crabdad

Hermit crabs submerge in both to maintain their shell water salinity. What many crabbers do is make pools out of Tupperware containers with ladders to climb out.


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As JoeHermits said, both. And yes, a 10gal gets small real fast. How big are your crabs? Do you think you may be able to upgrade soon? You can get good deals on used tanks. The bigger the better for what you can afford.

Like already mentioned both waters need to be deep enough to submerge. I have yet to see any of our purple pinchers willfully swim in either water. Most of the time they just hang out pool side and toe dip. On occasion I have startled them causing them to tuck in their shell and plop into the pool. My strawberries on the other hand go swimming in the salt pool quite often and for hours at a time!

As Joe mentioned plastic containers are the easiest and cheapest way to make water pools. It is always best to put one container in the substrate and add a few stones to the bottom. The second container is the one you will remove and fill with the water. Having the first container makes a barrier to protect burred crabs that are near the water. That way you run less of a risk of interrupting a molt. Also adding crafting mesh to the container with a few zipties allows them easy access in and out of the water.