HCA: Hermit Crab Association

so out of my three currently above-ground crabs, one is definitely the largest and uses it to her advantage. I usually put out two bowls of food, but if she wants she could easily sit on top of it and take up the whole thing. (the two smaller guys are about the size of ping pong balls, she is about 1.5 times their size)

when i refill their food dishes, my fatties immediately waddle over to the same one- i don't know why they don't disperse among the two, it's like they HAVE to eat together at the same dish. anyway, the bigger girl (Sandy) hogs most of the dish with her legs, and sometimes she actually kicks the other two to make them back off. I know that crabs like to establish a pecking order, but i always get so sad when she whacks one of the smaller guys and he scuttles off (even though they aren't really hurt).

sandy ends up eating most of the food, as she is quite big. I'm putting out enough food for all three, but Sandy is definitely eating all the yummy stuff first before the others can get to it. should i put out a third or even fourth bowl just so they have that option? or is the competition good?


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We have crabs that do the same thing. I just think when they see a crab munching in one food dish, they think it's better better than the other food fish. I wouldn't worry about a little pushing. If you see aggressive attacks I'd be more concerned.

Motörcrab wrote:We have crabs that do the same thing. I just think when they see a crab munching in one food dish, they think it's better better than the other food fish. I wouldn't worry about a little pushing. If you see aggressive attacks I'd be more concerned.

okay, thank you!


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I feed my hermit crabs with several small clam shells. This allows them to drag them off to eat them. I recently started adding a larger dish as well, so ones that didn't mind eating together could do that too.

I try to make my life easier by making mixes for my tanks once every couple of weeks. I take 9 containers and make different mixes for them, so they have different foods every day. In addition to that, I make leaf litter/flower/seed mixes that I add to my tanks as well. You have to do what works for you!