HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I am buying my first home and will be moving probably memorial day weekend. I will need to put my hermies in a smaller tank.
I have a 40G Long I assume the weight will be to much so IM thinking of removing the sub into buckets, What should I do if any hermies are down for molting?

If they are down molting, it is best not to disturb them, if at all possible. Two years ago, when we got the 90g, the woman who had had it had way too many crabs, which she wanted re-homed (most of them now live with Kip in crab Shangri-La in NM). In order to make the tank move-able, she took out most of the substrate, but left in about the bottom four inches or so. She didn't know whether there were crabs down in there or not. She put some moist substrate in a large storage container, and all the crabs that were on the surface in that container, for moving.

When we got the 90g where we wanted it in our house, I carefully layered moistened substrate over the layer she had left in there, set up some climbing structures as carefully as I could, and put the crabs back in. As it turned out, there definitely were some down molting, because I counted carefully putting the storage-container-transported crabs back into the 90g, and we ended up sending more than that number to Kip. So at least some of the crabs that were underground (probably molting at the time) did survive that move, emerged just fine, and even survived later being shipped out to New Mexico.

I know that others here HAVE dug up molters, put them in makeshift iso's, and I think had them survive as well. So I guess it's up to you what you feel comfortable doing.

I didn't have a choice about how to conduct that move, the woman who had the crabs had already arranged things that way when I arrived to take the 90g and the crabs; but I think it turned out as well as could be hoped. Of course, I do not know if any crabs that were down under that last four inches did not survive, since she did not know the total number of her crabs, and that bottom four inches of substrate has never been dug up/turned over yet. I plan to do that this summer, once our jumbo emerges from molt (assuming he eventually does--it's going on a year now that he has been down). I did turn over the "beach end" just last week, since I was pretty sure nobody was molting under there, and sure enough nobody was, and I didn't find any empty shells, either. So that's about 1/4 to 1/3 of the tank accounted for, no evidence of deaths. When I'm able to turn over the substrate in the rest of the tank, I'll sift through it for any empty shells (I'm "OCD" about recording what shells go into the tank, so if I find any empty shells unaccounted for on my list, I'll know they were left there by her crabs, possibly by one that didn't survive that move.) Overall, although I might not have chosen to do it that way beforehand, I think she probably did the best and most practical thing, for that move.

Best wishes, and congratulations on your new home!

ok im moving in the morning 11 hours from now. i need to remove some sub to make the tank lighter and safe to handle. what can i do if there are molters? i know that there are at least 5 of 9 up. its supposed to be 82 and humid tomorrow, i bought a large 30g tote to put them in for the move. I was thinking of using a 10 g tank to put them in then that inside of the tote. with some sub, food, water as they will be in there for roughly 2 days does this sound fine? and what about possible molters?

I realize this is way too late, I was in Florida helping my parents for awhile, so I wasn't able to respond. I'm sorry you didn't get any other feedback; I hope your move went well!

In case anybody else is reading this getting ready for another move, rather than a 10g, which will put the crabs very crowded together, I would recommend a similar thing to what the previous owner used for our rescue situation: a long, pretty wide, but not very deep (maybe 6 inches deep) storage container (like the ones they make for storing things under beds); put about a half inch to an inch of moist EE in it (for humidity), nestle two not-very tippable water sources (fresh and MSW) in there, maybe some moist moss. That would allow them to have more "floor space" to themselves, possibly cutting down on crowding-related aggression. If you are taking two days for the move, you can take the lid off and fan some fresh air in a couple of times during the move (especially if the weather is warm and humid, that should be perfectly fine).

If you think you might have molters, having some small but deep food storage containers (like quart-size or so ziploc containers) with small holes poked in the top and moistened moss in them to iso the molters would be good. Obviously, not disturbing the molters is always best.

Again, I'm sorry I could not get back to you before the move, and I hope it went well and everybody is settling in again well.