HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Crusty, our beloved PP past away a few days ago. We’re going to try again with the knowledge we’ve gained from caring for her.

It’s been a couple days since Crusty passed away. This design literally came to me in a dream. Maybe she was telling us something?

Flip flop the hide, shallow sub with water sources and moss opposite from the hide, close the heat pad. We will have incandescent lights over the top for heat as well.

We’ve gone through and added some items and removed others. We also finally received the big box of shells that I ordered some time ago. They are on the boil now.

Some of the moss has been removed from the second floor. I decided to leave the bare craft mesh as a climbing surface on the vertical wall.

We have both saltwater (small corner lagoon) and freshwater (larger lagoon) know too. We know they technically aren’t large enough, but this is a ten gallon tank and will do until I make room in the house for a twenty gallon tank and get that setup.

I’m in the process of ordering a new top to the tank and a light/infrared heater holder thing. More CF is on the way as well so I can bolster what’s there.

We’ll be picking up a couple crabs here in the next couple weeks on our trip to Warrenton, Oregon for pet supplies.

It is usable right now, but I want all the improvements done before we bring our new babies home.

~dad-one

(Dad-two is my husband, he’ll post in here on occasion as well, his posts will be marked under this user name as: ~dad-two)



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It’s looking great! Wondering if your heating pad is removable...just thinking that when you get your substrate, you’d want to move it up and long ways to get the most out of it. Once the sub is higher, half of that uth will be heating the sub part and you want the full pad to just heat the air above it. I know you said you have more heat sources coming...remember with heat lamps, you can’t fully cover the top since you can’t sit the heat lamps directly down...and if the top isn’t fully covered, you’ll lose heat/humidity. Heat lamps alone tend to zap humidity. Hate to mention this stuff, I know you guys have worked hard on the tank. It’s coming from a place of truly trying to help. I think it’s pretty cool that the crabitat idea came in a dream...I like to think it was lil Crusty . (Sorry if you already knew the things I mentioned!)


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crabbycasey wrote:It’s looking great! Wondering if your heating pad is removable...just thinking that when you get your substrate, you’d want to move it up and long ways to get the most out of it. Once the sub is higher, half of that uth will be heating the sub part and you want the full pad to just heat the air above it. I know you said you have more heat sources coming...remember with heat lamps, you can’t fully cover the top since you can’t sit the heat lamps directly down...and if the top isn’t fully covered, you’ll lose heat/humidity. Heat lamps alone tend to zap humidity. Hate to mention this stuff, I know you guys have worked hard on the tank. It’s coming from a place of truly trying to help. I think it’s pretty cool that the crabitat idea came in a dream...I like to think it was lil Crusty . (Sorry if you already knew the things I mentioned!)


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I’ll likely go to using an infrared heat bulb thing.



Thank you.

She knew that we were doing our best.

I had a 25watt light bulb in there that kept it at 80° consistently. The heat pad even uncovered like it is, doesn’t keep up.

I’ll be using a different lid too.

It’ll be a struggle to keep humidity up, but heat in the tank matters most right now.


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I’m not familiar with those. Hope it makes it easy to maintain the heat for your future crabbies, they will be lucky to have owners that care . Good luck with it all!


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We adopted two new crabs from Petco this afternoon.

I was happy to see they had plenty of substrate to dig down, the display was clean and they had the temperature and humidity really visible.

Crusty’s legacy will live on.

Welcome home Mr. Crabs and Squidward. Combined, These two boys are 1/4 the size of Crusty.

They are both PP’s and have started settling in.

Squidward has decided the moss on the ramp makes a great bed, while Mr. Crabs decided that a stroll through the shell shop and then a climb up the inside wall of the hide were in order.



Tiny!

Again, tiny!

New lid, heat lamp dome, heat lamp and light bulb.

They boys are in!

Mr. Crabs wasted no time in going for a stroll through the shell shop.

He didn’t pick out a new shell yet, but did climb up the inside of the hide.

Squidward is relaxing in the moss.

Crabitat 2.0 all set up and running. The thermostat now controls the infrared heat lamp/bulb thing. The cords look atrocious, but that’ll get fixed.

I can do all the maintenance from this side now. No more racing over the kitchen counter.


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Looks good so far! I hope they settle in.

Oh. My. Goodness. Those crabs are the cutest tiniest little things ever!! I am so excited for you! Love the names...we have a Sandy and a Gary (meow), lol. Also got my little guy Flash from Petco and I was pleased with the conditions as well. Tank looks awesome and those tiny little crabbies have a great space to live in! Please keep posting pics of these 2!


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Pumpkincrab wrote:Looks good so far! I hope they settle in.

They seem to be. The moss started falling off the ramp, so I moved Squidward, took out that section of moss and he’s been exploring ever since.

Mr. Crabs has been hiding up in the corner of the hide.
Squidward on the move!

Mr. Crabs says hello.


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crabbycasey wrote:Oh. My. Goodness. Those crabs are the cutest tiniest little things ever!! I am so excited for you! Love the names...we have a Sandy and a Gary (meow), lol. Also got my little guy Flash from Petco and I was pleased with the conditions as well. Tank looks awesome and those tiny little crabbies have a great space to live in! Please keep posting pics of these 2!


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The adorable for sure!

They’ve got their own little personalities too.

I was impressed by the Petco conditions. I would have liked to seen a little deeper sub, but I understand that this isn’t their final home so compromises must be made.

I couldn’t resist the spongebob references. There are no regrets here.

~dad-one


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Dad-One wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 02, 2020 1:48 am

The adorable for sure!

They’ve got their own little personalities too.

I was impressed by the Petco conditions. I would have liked to seen a little deeper sub, but I understand that this isn’t their final home so compromises must be made.

I couldn’t resist the spongebob references. There are no regrets here.

~dad-one


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You're right about the personalities. I have 5 crabs ranging in size- 2 tiny, 1 extra small, and 2 small. Each one does have a seperate personality!
For example, Koda and Mango really seem to be friends. (they're both tiny.) Sadly, Koda and Blackberry are down and Mango has been looking a bit sad. I hope they'll come back up soon.
Pine, Mango and Pumpkin are my 3 crabs who aren't down right now. Pumpkin really likes to hang out with Pine. Pumpkin's also a massive troublemaker and explorer. Pine has been a tad quiet, but it's my fault due to a sudden heat pad emergency (it came off???) which I need to fix again.
So you really get to know every crab's own little personality, it's amazing.

Well, I missed it.

Mr. Crabs was in the freshwater lagoon for a minute.



I turned on their lights this morning and Mr. Crabs zoomed down the ramp, across the tank, sat in the middle under the light for a minute and then went for a swim. Now he’s chilling by the pool, catching some rays.

Squidward decided to just hang out on the second floor and chill.


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So cute!

Pumpkincrab wrote:So cute!

That they are!

Somebody is using the moss as a hide.



I waited until he moved, then put the barrel decor in. These boys can fit in it, whereas crusty couldn’t. I’m waiting to see if they’ll use it.

Caught him running off the plate after snagging some crushed egg shell. Yes, that is an oyster shell for a plate. We had oysters for dinner one night and these were the flatest of them. They’ve already eaten the little bits of oyster that were stuck to it.


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I smiled the entire way through reading all that and seeing those pictures . So stinkin cute!


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crabbycasey wrote:I smiled the entire way through reading all that and seeing those pictures . So stinkin cute!


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They make everyone smile. Which we desperately need right now.


I caught the boys snuggling together inside the barrels this morning.


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