HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Ok so I have been posting here about how I had a long string of new crabs die on me until one female crab who I named snow white because she is so pale managed to live. she wont eat and only picked at some frosted mini wheat's once. she spent days and says behind a rock in her shell and I would come over and flip it up a little bit to see if shes still alive and she just wiggles around in the shell and I put her back. tonight after getting home from hanging out from my friend I go to the tank and notice that she has a giant white shell instead of her normal one but then I realized thats not her its actually Gumbo who just dug himself up from molting for three weeks and he flipped the poor girl over on her back and he was standing on top of her while she was huddled into her shell. I picked him up and put him on the other side of the tank and checked snow white and she was all unresponsive and shut tight in her shell. She was in the middle of de-stressing and now I think Gumbo terrified her. I distracted him by putting some walnuts in a shell bowl for him and he is pigging out. should I be worried about her? I dont know what do do. He has not messed with her ever since that. and i dont even know what went down between the two.

I have only been at this for a few months so will give you my thoughts. I am sure you will get others also.

It may have been nothing. But, it sounds like Snow White Isn't all that healthy and so may be easy prey for the newly up molter. I had a crab murdered for his shell once and it wasn't a pretty site and an even worse feeling. I would iso the weak one, a It sounds as though she needs help anyways. Then when she is stronger and you feel that she can hold her own, then reintroduce her when you can supervise them together for the first few times.

It might help also to know what happened to the others, although, then again, it may not have a bearing on this case.

If you could cut/paste and fill this form out and post it here, it could help with figuring out why your crabs keep dying. Unfortunately most of the care info we receive from pet stores or retailers is outdated or outright dangerous for the crabs
viewtopic.php?t=46102

If you can post that below and answer all the questions, someone can help you. [SMILING FACE WITH SMILING EYES]

I will keep an eye on this post

soilentgringa wrote:If you could cut/paste and fill this form out and post it here, it could help with figuring out why your crabs keep dying. Unfortunately most of the care info we receive from pet stores or retailers is outdated or outright dangerous for the crabs
viewtopic.php?t=46102

If you can post that below and answer all the questions, someone can help you. [SMILING FACE WITH SMILING EYES]

Well I figured out the deaths had nothing to do with my tank but the winter is killing/making the crabs sick when they go to the pet store and the pet store has bad conditions on top of that. Every time I went in there several crabs were dead or have limbs scattered around the tank. The weather in Missouri is unforgiving during winter. I got Gumbo and his old tank mate during the summer so its was not hard for them to adjust. But snow white over here was active at first for a little bit but decided to just be inside her shell for days and days. ever since her encounter with Gumbo she now has her legs out like normal now and Gumbo seems to be giving her some space. Im worried because I dont know how she is supposed to molt when she wont eat or drink anything to store nutrients to make a molt sac. I guess all I can do is wait.

Looks Like I spoke to soon. I herd some shuffling noise from the tank and I looked and Gumbo flipped Snow white over again. Gumbo ran off when he saw me but now snow white is deep in her shell again and is back into defensive mode. why does he keep doing this?

Dip them both in the fw pool. It will make them smell neutral and it could help. Are they wearing similar sized shells?

KellyCrabbieLove wrote:Dip them both in the fw pool. It will make them smell neutral and it could help. Are they wearing similar sized shells?

Yea they are similar seized but Gumbo is a little bit bigger. I dont know if I even can dip Snow White in fresh water because she wont come out of the shell and she is already stressed enough. I did try though but that made her retreat into the shell even more and be even more unresponsive. maybe some time in the future I will try again . I have 6 shells lieing around for them to be in and as soon as Gumbo came up he switched into one of them. But Snow Whites shell is one of the best most unique shells I have ever seen. It looks like its made out of stone or something and the inside has that smooth, glistening look to it. Its hard to explain.

How are you heating and maintaining humidity of your crabitat, if you don't mind my asking? The reason for the questionnaire is to get a good all around picture of what kind of space the crabs are in and if its a possibility that something environmental is stressing them out. Also, repeated handling and bathing can stress them out pretty badly. Sometimes it's best not to touch them for a bit. How many shells do you have for them?

bocoom wrote:
Well I figured out the deaths had nothing to do with my tank but the winter is killing/making the crabs sick when they go to the pet store and the pet store has bad conditions on top of that. Every time I went in there several crabs were dead or have limbs scattered around the tank. The weather in Missouri is unforgiving during winter. I got Gumbo and his old tank mate during the summer so its was not hard for them to adjust. But snow white over here was active at first for a little bit but decided to just be inside her shell for days and days. ever since her encounter with Gumbo she now has her legs out like normal now and Gumbo seems to be giving her some space. Im worried because I dont know how she is supposed to molt when she wont eat or drink anything to store nutrients to make a molt sac. I guess all I can do is wait.

I agree that we need to know your conditions. I live in a colder state than you and have gotten crabs during the cold and have had no problems, and there were several dead ones at the store. Once I get them home into a warm, humid tank with excellent substrate and nutritious food, they pig out and molt.

There has to be an underlying reason that you lost so many crabs, and possibly why you have another weak one. We can't help you figure it out unless you give us more information.

1) I use coconut fiber substrate and its 4 inches deep.
2)yes I have one the measures the heat and humidity at the same time and its at the top right of the tank. the humidity stays at 80 no matter what. and the heat is between 70 and 80 when im in the room with the heater on but when im not there its almost 60
3) no heat source except a heater
4) I have fresh and salt water. the fresh water is from the fringe and its purified in there. I use saltwater from a solution by "all living things" 1 tsp of it. she only drunk the fresh water a little bit.
5)all kinds of food. chicken liver, nuts,cereal, just about everything. its taken out the next day.
6) Only had her for 3 weeks I think and its purple pincer
7)glass tank I think its 12 gallon
8 ) only two in the tank they are pretty big I dont know how I can measure them though
9) there are 5
10) none
11) clean it every day
12)nope
13)nope
14) and those crabs that died there were only 3 of them. the first one looked pretty sick when I got him and was frozen in one position and comatose pretty much and died the next day. the second one was way active at first but them stayed in its shell after a day and its limbs fell off and it died. the third one was perfectly fine for a day or two and them when inside the little igloo and just died. this one is still alive and was active at first but only for about an hour or two before going back in her shell now she just hangs out inside her shell not eating or doing much of anything day after day. Gumbo on the other hand is very energetic now and is all over the place inside the tank after the molt.
and thats pretty much it.

A couple of things...first, your tank needs to stay a constant temperature. Most use a side mounted tank heater, like Zoomed or Ultratherm. The crabs live in the Caribbean, where it is always warm and humid. 60 degrees will kill them. Not sure why your big guy is still around, but I can almost guarantee that is what is happening. If you read through posts about the conditions we try to meet to make our crabs happy and healthy, you will see that number 1 is temp and humidity.

The water situation is also a concern. The closest to actual sea water is Instant Ocean, and for fresh, purified might be ok if chlorine and such is removed. A lot of things are sold as being good for hermit crabs but are not. We were all misinformed when we first bought them. The stores wouldn't sell many if they told you that you had to spend a lot of money to set up their habitat just right. It is something everyone wants to change, and it is slowly but you were probably misled like the rest of us.

I am so glad that you cared enough about your crabs to come here and let us help you figure out what is happening. Everything else on your list looks pretty good so you are almost there. You may be able to pull the little one through if you can get that heat up but only time will tell. Once they start dropping claws, well, you have been there, and so have we all. I killed 2 before I figured it out from reading here. So don't feel bad.

Let us know how it goes and what we can do to help.

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If you have some all natural peanut butter with NO ADDITIVES OR HYDROGENATED OILS and some raw honey you can put some on the end of a qtip and prop it up near your crab very close or see if it will eat off of the qtip offered gently. Make sure she has water of both kinds that has been dechlorinated near her as well. Sometimes crabs need weeks to recover from pps and if the tat conditions arent favorable they can just drop all their limbs and die. Please read the care sheets and post photos if you can of the shell theyre fighting over so we can identify it for you. Ultratherm heaters by Bean Farm have the best reviews, but you definitely need a heat source and to calibrate the hygrometer. Good luck, I hope your crabs pull through.

well she is dead now. fourth crab in a row. Gumbo is doing fine anyway. Its like hes a new crab after the molt he is constantly bouncing around everywhere. she looked sick and weak anyway and I knew she was not going to make it. She looked like she was putting off her molt for a long time judging by her paleness everywhere and her cloudy eyes and v shaped eyes and I read if they do that it will become to late and they will be to weak to molt and will die. At least she died in a better place this time but now my gumbo is all alone AGAIN. I remember yesterday he walked up to her and tried touching his feelers in the shell entrance and she weakly poked her feelers out and touched his for a little bit. At least he got SOME interaction from another crab after about a year by himself. I think I will wait for the spring to buy another one this is getting ridiculous with all these guys dyeing on me. Guess its just me and gumbo from now on.