HCA: Hermit Crab Association

After about two and a half months, my jumbo PP Atabey finally came back up from a molt on Friday morning. He's super furry and a beautiful burgundy color. Here's the thing, he's been out and about at night, but every morning since then, he's been digging himself completely underground during the day. Then at night he comes back to the surface. This behavior leaves some crazy big craters all over the crabitat and I'm concerned about a buried molter. Is this normal post-molt behavior? None of my other PPs have done this. Maybe he's looking for complete darkness during the day? Any insight would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

some of my crabs like to dig down during the day and resurface at night. Since it's a large crab do you have anywhere suitable for them to hide on the surface? My large is content in the moss pits during the day. Another question would be, is the humidity around 80%? If there are large enough hides and humidity is where it should be, I'd guess the crabbie feels more comfortable in the substrate during the day.

How large of a tank do you have and how much substrate? Do you have varied protein available each day?

My 2 largest PPs which are large, bordering on jumbo have been digging back down periodically for a part of a day since they came up from molting about a month ago. Even in my 90 it causes huge, empty shell swallowing, gopher holes!

@SoulLonely: there are several hideys in the tank, but I may need to get a larger cave or something similar. The humidity is 77-80%. The tank is 55 gallons, with about 10" of sand/EE mix for substrate. I provide different sources of protein including eggs, chicken, crickets & mealworms. The food dish looks like a disaster area in the mornings so I know the jumbo is pigging out at night.

@CrabbyMom33: sounds very familiar lol.

My medium does this as well. The giant craters left by her too big shell are certainly worrying when I think of my larger medium who is molting...and I have no clue where he is either.

Each crab has it's own personality. I have the medium, Azula, who buries frequently, and I have some smalls who never bury unless they are molting.

My small used to dig all the time. She doesn't as much now, but I also have a treasure chest that would be used in an aquarium. She now digs very little. I think that the big guy just wants his privacy. I wouldn't be worried. So long as you fill in the holes that the jumbo digs it shouldn't cause any damage. I have a small question though. What is considered small? Medium? Jumbo? Are the almost baby ones the smalls, or are they called 'mini' or 'tiny'? Please help. Mine is about yay big:

_______________________
|This is the shell size . |
|Well, if her shell was |
|a perfect rectangle |
| |
|_____________________|

I know that that wasn't a very good answer but, well, I made clear what I was trying to say. (Didn't I?)

My borderline large was digging a bunch of gopher holes right after he came up from a four month molt, until put in a really large piece of pipe in, perfect size for him Only cost a couple bucks at a hardware store. Now he just hangs out in there eating a sponge.
When B came up, he pigged out! Like holy moly pigged out! I can't believe a small critter could pack away so much food. He also changed shells three times

ElBrujo wrote:@SoulLonely: there are several hideys in the tank, but I may need to get a larger cave or something similar. The humidity is 77-80%. The tank is 55 gallons, with about 10" of sand/EE mix for substrate. I provide different sources of protein including eggs, chicken, crickets & mealworms. The food dish looks like a disaster area in the mornings so I know the jumbo is pigging out at night.

@CrabbyMom33: sounds very familiar lol.

since it's a big tank with lots of substrate and you provide good protein, I wouldn't worry too much about the big guy hunting for molters

and since humidity is right were it's supposed to be, he's prolly not digging down because it is more humid in the substrate, so he prolly just enjoys digging down during the day

I wouldn't worry about it!

Thanks for all the responses
I'll be shopping for a larger hiding spot this week. In the meantime, I'll try to catch him out for a photo or two.

I have a large cork round in my tank that my jumbo loves. It's big enough for him to fit comfortably in, and the others love to sit on top. I've never had any mold problems with it, and my tank stays at 80/80. I got it at petco, and it didn't cost much.




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Do you have the cork round just on the substrate? I have a big one that I ordered that I want to put in when I remodel some time this spring or early summer. I've been thinging about where I want to put it since it's so big.