Help!Hermit Crab Attacked,alive but very weak after 67 days

[weaverg]

My 10 year old hermit crab was attacked 36days into her molt by the 11 year old crab, so I separated them. I screwed up and did not separate them this time since they have never attacked one another. I'm just devastated.

Condition: The 10 year old is very weak and has a left leg missing and the two on the right side look like they were broken and healed in a deformed way. She isn't strong enough nor has enough mobility with the multiple leg injuries and deformities to get in her shell or even move it. She used to be so robust when she was well, but now I'm not sure she can climb into her water bowl.

My daughter has had this crab since 3rd grade and she is 19 years old now, and I have been taking care of them since 2006.

How should take care of her since she is without a shell as far as moisture and feeding? I keep 5-6" of moist sand on one half of a large aquarium that has a Hydrometer I keep at around 70% and temp gauge I keep around 70-80 deg. Should I feed her the same hermit crab food I have which is Tetrafauna Hermit Crab Meal and cakes, Zoo Med Fruit Salad and Peanut Butter Crunchies, and T-rex Fruit and Food crab food).

Thanks in advance for your help if you know what I should do!

George

[fandt94]

So sorry to hear this! I’m not experienced enough to give you solid advice so hopefully one of our veterans here will pop in ASAP....I DO know, however, if your crab is not in a shell you need to try and re-shell her/him. Some threads below that might help....

viewtopic.php?f=25&t=92528

viewtopic.php?f=27&t=117985&p=1063612&h ... g#p1063612

[weaverg]

Thanks. I will try to figure out a way she can get in and out of one to keep moist. She is so weak, since I dug her up a few hours ago she seems exhausted.

[GotButterflies]

I'm a little confused by this post. First of all, I am very sorry about all of this! The hermit crab needs to be reshelled asap.
Gently rinse hermit crab's abdomen in fw of the tank if it is covered in substate. Locate shell that the hermit crab was previously in. Rinse that in the fw of the crabitat. Gently uncurl the abdomen and back the crab into the shell.

Why did you have to dig her up?

Offer her plenty of calcium, protein and raw honey.

Please fill out the emergency template for us. Thank you. viewtopic.php?f=27&t=46102

Edit: Also, I personally recommend humidity to be at least 80

[fandt94]

I'm a little confused by this post. First of all, I am very sorry about all of this! The hermit crab needs to be reshelled asap.
Gently rinse hermit crab's abdomen in fw of the tank if it is covered in substate. Locate shell that the hermit crab was previously in. Rinse that in the fw of the crabitat. Gently uncurl the abdomen and back the crab into the shell.

Why did you have to dig her up?

Offer her plenty of calcium, protein and raw honey.

Please fill out the emergency template for us. Thank you. viewtopic.php?f=27&t=46102

Edit: Also, I personally recommend humidity to be at least 80

To me it sounded like the other crab encountered/dug up the molter? Or maybe the molter came up and was noticeably attacked? I could have misunderstood though....

[fandt94]

Please keep us updated! Seems you have taken such good care of your crabs for many years....

[weaverg]

Sorry for any confusion, the non-molter dug down in the sand and attached the molter on day 36. I re-buryed the molter with a little cavern. She looked huge right after the attack, but she has lost a lot of size and quite injured. I put the injured crab back in her old shell last night and this morning took her out of the large aquarium since she is not mobile enough to climb and put her into small 6"x10" aquarium with 1/2" of small reptile rocks with 1/8" of water in the tank and a heater underneath for humidity. I put a small cloth for her to rest on if she gets out of her shell. I put in a small water bowl, ground cuttlefish bone, protein mix, small salt water, oatmeal. I will put Honey in when I get home tonight. I've been bathing her every chance I get because she get's out of her shell and want to be sure she can stay hydrated.

I dug her up after 67 days because she normally took 35 to 52 days to molt over the last 10 years ( longer as she aged), and she was in very weak condition, so I think this was the right move. She is not moving her antennae and looked like she would die if I didn't intervene.

Thanks so much for any help. I will try to get to the Emergency form mentioned completed when I get home from work.
Thanks
George

[weaverg]

My crab Pixie died today around 3pm. I realize now I've had Pixie since early Dec 2006, so I've had her almost 12 years not counting how long the pet store had her. That means I've had Pixie's companion Charlotte almost 13 years old ( Charlotte attacked Pixie under the sand while she was molting on 9-5-18) . Charlotte never attacked Pixie before so I've learned a very hard lesson and realize this was 100% preventable which just makes me mourn so for what could have been. I got Pixie for my daughter when I was 49 years old as a companion to Charlotte who we got in Jan-Feb 2006 as I had read that it was good for their health. I'll be 62 in late Dec, so I can barely remember not taking care of both of them. Charlotte is in great health also, so she may out live me!

Pixie was in the best of health before the attack. They were always making all kinds of racket climbing and tumbling all over the place. I made yearly trips to the beach to get 6ea one gallon ziplock bags of sand that they have always lived in which I kept moist continuously.

Please feel free to share this lesson I had to learn the hard way of what could have been had I just seperated the crabs during Pixie's molt.

[RiNiKy506]

I am so sorry for your loss, you gave her a good life, I’m sure she was very happy. How can you tell when to separate them when they molt? Don’t they normally dig down and you don’t know what they’re doing while they’re under? I haven’t gone through a molt yet and I’m so scared to.


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[fandt94]

I’m so very sorry for your loss.....you gave Pixie a great home and life! I don’t think there was anything more you could have done to prevent what happened. You couldn’t have predicted what happened.....again I am very sorry and I sure hope you don’t give up on crabbing after so many years of having done so!

[curlysister]

I am also sorry for your loss. I would still encourage you to fill in the emergency template, so we can help with optimal conditions. Crabs do not need to be put in isolation to molt, if there is enough room and tank conditions are good.

My Sonny dug up Cher earlier this year, after having them for over 7 years. When I posted and asked for assistance, I learned that I did not have enough substrate for how large they had grown - and this resulted in Sonny coming across Cher when he was digging. She lost one leg in the 'attack' - which I don't really think was a true attack in which he meant to hurt her, I think he just accidentally came across her because I didn't have the tank conditions optimal. I corrected the problems, and she has molted twice since, regrowing her missing leg during the first molt. Sonny also molted at the same time as she did, for the second molt.

In hindsight, there are also things that may have been done differently when your crab was dug up. HCA doesn't recommend re-burying - putting in isolation is recommended. And when a crab is down, it should not be dug up, even if it has been longer than a 'usual' molt, except for extreme emergencies such as a flood or bacterial bloom.