HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I wish I knew at what point he will be out of the woods!

Well, last night I gave Tumbler a salt/chamomile bath and let him wander the floor for a while. I offered him some grub which he chowed down mightily. It was some dried mango skin, walnuts crushed into a powder and drizzled w/ raw egg white and honey. I am bonding w/ him as I nurse him and so I really hope he makes it more than ever. He's the friendliest he's ever been and I'm sure it is because I have had to handle him so much to doctor his wounds. The day before I took him out for a little late afternoon sunshine and some excersice. He's pretty active which is surprising.

This has been a great post. I am glad to see you are progressing! I hope he keeps coming around. It is very easy to bond w/ them...

He's eating good... that is a good sign.

Well, his appetite and his activity are still good. He has a couple more spots, but they aren't as dark as before and seem to be progressing slower (not like the first dark segment that got very black in just a few days and crumbled away). His color is improving all-over. I can see that his exo was badly damaged during the molt. It looks as if every leg segment has an extra joint like they each buckled before the exo hardened. He gets around fine though.

Today another crab surfaced in the main tank. Freshly molted, perfect, and no sign of bacterial infection! I was so afraid that I would have a plague. The other E dug so that there was a brief window to his digging & from what I could see of him, he is healthy. I don't think he is a molt candidate, but we shal see what transpires.

I will share this, altho' I will surely get some scolding for it: I have the last 3 days been treating him this way: I mushed a large fresh aloe vera leaf into a bowl and added 2 drops of tea tree oil and about 1 tablespoon of a tea made from saltwater, dried chamomile, and fresh echinacea leaves. I mixed it all well and only dab the affected areas w/ a qtip. I think it has arrested the spread of the spots and the spots have lightened to a gray rather than the black that they were before. I am careful to give him a pre-bath to rinse the concoction off before letting him soak in strong saltbath--hoping that it will prevent him from injesting any and so as not to contaminate his gills w/ something that is likely not perfectly safe.

I am happy to hear he is still hanging in there. Do you think he is improving? I know you said the spots are lightening.

it sounds like you are doing an excellant job of nursing him, and its not surprising that youre bonding with the little cutie. i would think that mobility and good eating would be very positive signs. do you have any pics of him in his current state?

Caroline

I had taken some photos of him earlier, but forget to bring my camera into work w/ me to post them. Now they are kinda out-dated, so maybe I'll take a few more this weekend and post them Monday.
I think he is improving over-all. I'm scared that there appear to be more spots, but hopeful since the spots are lightening. The first spot spread fairly quickly and darkened to a deep black before it crumbled away. The stub where that part fell off is still dark, but not getting worse by any means.

I returned him to the main tank. He immediately dug down and I didn't see him for a day or two. Today he is up, but two legs are missing (well, there is a nub of one). Bits of the leg were littered about the cave where he surfaced. I might be worried enough to iso him again if I was certain that it was cannibalism, but the infected legs are the ones that are missing (so I didn't have to amputate), and the nub doesn't look infected. I removed the leg bits, but I need to research the dropped limbs and cannibalism topics and find out what I'm dealing with. Any thoughts?

Geez I just went thru this yesterday.........if the legs were the bad ones this may be a good thing. I guess you cant watch him cause your home at night...watch for gel limbs and see if he acts funny. Maybe play it by ear for now good luck

I think that this could be a good sign, does he have black marks on the other claws/legs remaining?

Caroline

there are still two tiny, faded spots on his big pincer and his end segment on another leg, but much less than the other legs. I think it is a good sign too, but i'm gonna keep an eye out for any aggression today since I can't watch them at night.

what are the white areas? one of my hermeis, Qwerty has them a bit.

white areas? when I said "faded" I meant faded from black to gray. I don't know what light areas mean, but I knew bad things were happening when he came out of his molt so light all over w/ a gritty texture and then had black spots.

If he dropped his limbs it would be by segment, right? One leg has half of a segment left. Does that signify cannabalism?

they can drop segments and whole legs