Can my crabs travel with me?

[Tarn]

Hi everyone

I have a couple of related questions. I live in Sydney Australia but do a lot of work in Melbourne (and my partner lives there).
I go to Melbourne for between 1 and 2 weeks at a time and I don't like leaving my hermies for anyone else to look after.
I have seen Krabooz (a pretty average supplier of crabs and crab products) advertise a travel home called a 'liferingz'. Does anyone have an experience with something like this? Or any type of travel house?

Also importantly can my hermies go on an aeroplane? the flight is a little over one hour and I would keep them with me at all times.
I love them and I would love to take them with me but of course I don't want to do anything to hurt of distress them.
Also this would all hinge on the nine of them all being above ground at the time.

Any advice would be great, thanks

[wodesorel]

As far as the plane, you have to call the airlines to find out what their rules are for pets. Some are okay with it, some will charge you per crab like they were dog s(!) and some refuse entry. If they are permitted you want to get a statement in writing before your flight occurs to cut down on the chance that an employee at the gate will refuse them entry and cause you to miss your flight - not all employees will know all the rules. The crabs should never be checked, carry-on only!

Traveling with them is stressful - so long as you can keep them humid and warm it should be okay so long as they aren't molting. There is no way to control when a crab will molt and their molting cycle cannot be altered or they may surface molt or put off molting with is deadly. My worry would be if one needed to molt during a two week trip when you were out of town! Getting him back home safely may be impossible since I doubt an airline would let you travel with a tank of substrate.

[YYWW]

I was just checking out the Krabooz facebook page.. The lifering looks like a bucket with dirt in it. Their products look very gaudy, and they heavily promote painted shells and handling crabs. Personally, i would not buy their products as their crabbing style does not fall in line with mine.


Crabbers unite!!!

[Tarn]

Thanks for the advice
As for Krabooz, they are problematic. I posted about the awful conditions that I saw in a store. They seem to have cornered the market in Sydney at least.

Thanks
Tarn

[thermidor]

If you are gone for one week I would 100% leave them at home. As long as everything is very stable and on auto-pilot (humidity, temp, etc.) your main worry is to have plenty of fresh water (as well as having salt water of course). Two or more dishes that can't be overturned and you will be covered if someone drags in something that wicks out the water.

I don't think there is any way humanly possible to have stable humidity and temp when travelling and that sounds way more stressful to me than them having to eat just dry food for a few days.

I pushed the limit when I went to Europe last year for a full three weeks. When I arrived home, my waters were still clean, there was still food left, a couple of molters had emerged, and no one was at all worse for the wear.

I have my UTH's on a thermostat and all the lights on timers, and I checked the min and max temps and humidity and there was almost no variation; I had run this test for a month before I left so I was pretty confident that barring a major natural disaster like an earthquake everything would be fine.

I am sure that some people won't agree with me and would prefer to have someone come over and check on them. The problem with that, with crabs, is they could leave the tank partly open (no humidity! escapees!) or something worse than just leaving them be.

[Tarn]

Thanks, my huge fear is someone looking after them and not closing the lid.