HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I've seen a couple of posts regarding what to do do in a flood, but I would really like some advice pertaining to my particular situation before I do anything that might make matters worse! I still don't understand how, but my tank flooded twice in the last month so there was 1- 1 1/2 inches of standing water at the bottom. I followed the advice here with kitchen towels, dry Eco earth and even tampons (my housemates think I have finally lost it!) and absorbed the water both times, but 3 of my 4 crabs have been down molting for this entire period and I fear the worst. Furthermore, when I dug down into one corner to the bottom, it wasn't strong but there was that slight rotten egg smell indicative of bacterial bloom. Nothing fishy though when I've dug little holes with a chopstick where I think the crabs are.
Yesterday I bought new sand and Eco earth prepared to do a deep clean swapping out my substrate but I'm so scared to start digging. My biggest crab molted for 4 months last time so it is possible they're still alive and well. Is it time to disturb them?

Couldn't figure out how to get the template on my iPad so let me know if I missed anything: 30 gallon tank, 7 inch deep substrate (4:1 sand/Eco earth mix), temp 80, humidity 85, 4 PPs.

How far past their normal molting schedule are they? If they are several months past the time when you normally see them up for their molts than I would dig. But even more importantly I would think would be figuring out why your tank has flooded yet again.

I honestly wouldn't be worried how long they've been down under normal circumstances - big one has been down a month and he was down 4 months last time. The other two are mediums and have been down 2 weeks and 3. I've just gathered that floods can lead to lethal levels of bacteria and don't know how urgent it is to deal with that.

As for the cause, I think I have a hypothesis. I recently put a lot of moss in there which they love, but they drag it into the water pools and it might be that the moss is then wicking up water into the substrate. I also know now I was misting too much, so have calmed down on that front.

I suppose that would be possible. That would be a simple fix. And you are SURE it's not your water dishes? Every time I've had a flood (2 or three times) it's been due to a dang pool......

There are several ways I could see about going about this because it sounds like the tow medium molters may be in the shedding part of the molt, which is the riskiest time to dig, but also the greatest risk if there's a bacterial bloom. I mean, you definitely want that bacterial bloom outta there, so you have to dig that out. That will tell you a lot about how much of a bacterial issue you've got going on in there. What I might do is use that hole when you remove the bad substrate for my first soak hole for paper towels or more EE. I'f the substrate on the bottom looks really soaked, and you check outward from the standing water in a few places here and there (try not to check in places molters are or are likely to be like avoiding corners or along the sides) you may be able to determine if the entire first few inches on the bottom are soaked a crossed the entire tank, or not. If the whole first few inches are sopping wet (as was the case in my last flood) no molter is going to be able to make a tunnel in that and I think that would case some bad molts, closer to the surface or surface molts IF they have the energy to molt that way. My last flood I was lucky that it occurred after most of my molters were almost done, and the soft fella who had just shed was ISOed and is fine.

It's one of those choices in crabbing that are hard, because there is risk either way.

Thank you for your advice! I went ahead expanding the hole outwards where I was reasonably certain no crabs would be, until I came across the one that's been down for 3 weeks looking fine! He hadn't started molting as far as I could tell so I just loosely placed some new substrate and moss around him. I felt so bad for disturbing him but am actually stunned he's alive.

There's certainly some bacteria in there as it is rotten eggy, only in patches of saturated sand that weren't mixed with Eco earth. I scooped out as much as I could and have probably swapped out a third of the substrate entirely. I'm going to stop now but I know there's still bad sand in there at the end with the other molters. the good news is the sand really wasn't that wet at the bottom anymore and is certainly sandcastle consistency, so the flood is over. I just hope me agitating the substrate just now was enough to limit the bacteria problem.

I was also stunned so many molters were okay through the flooding too. But like I said, mostly they had finished and the tank hadn't been flooded very long before I noticed it. But that substrate was totally soaked. Like I dug a hole about 4 or so inches down and water filled it immediately.

You might want to periodically while those molters are down just check a small patch of the substrate like you did this time and make sure you don't smell that rotten eggs smell anymore.

landlubber wrote:How far past their normal molting schedule are they? If they are several months past the time when you normally see them up for their molts than I would dig. But even more importantly I would think would be figuring out why your tank has flooded yet again.

But dig Carefully! If you must. I accidentally dug up a molter and have him covered at this point

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I just wanted to provide an update in case someone like me in the future comes on here looking for some reassurance on this matter. My largest came up over the Easter weekend (I'll leave the symbolic interpretations up to you!) completing the lot. All my molters survived The Flood! Ahem.