HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Ok, so I got my crabbies yesterday, and 3 of 4 buried under... I'm pretty sure they're on the ee side cause I think I made my sand to wet! two buried down in the container on the way home and after I transfered them to my main I haven't seen anything from them since!! I'm pretty sure they're destressing. Then my crab sparkle buried down some time last night while I was asleep. Can I pat down/smooth out my ee without hurting them, so that I can try to see if they come up? Buddy, the 4th one is just hiding in a "corner" next to a hut! Every so often he taps his legs like someone drumming their fingers on a desk! What's he impatiant about? He barely even saw the other crabs!

I also hear people talking about digging up shells and such. Do you always know where your crabs are before digging? Or are you just hoping not to disturb anyone?

ok, I'm goin to bed now so I'm going to just smooth the ee really carefully!! Hope it's ok!

It can take weeks even for crabs to destress, all u can do is wait. Keep a close eye on the tank and keep smelling it to make sure nothing smells bad (like a dead crab). Mine are under aswell, i re did my crabitat and the forest bedding had little white bugs so i had to take the crabs out and bath them and put them in the isolation tank and all that fun stuff... Not sure if patting down the EE will be good, if u were to collapse or disturb a molting crab it could stress them and thats never good. Dont be 2 worried, prob. just destressing and will be up before you know it

They're most likely destressing or molting.

Smoothing out the EcoEarth gently shouldn't hurt them.

Sometimes hermit crabs just like making noise against the glass. Or maybe he's impatient because his new friends won't come up to play. Who knows what our crabbies are thinking?

I bought 4 crabs over my recent spring break, 4 cute little Es. I see three of them occasionally, but not much. Most of the time they are buried. 2 of the 3 that come up every once and a while have definitely molted, and one lost a leg somewhere. Beats me, he just popped up yesterday. Do relate this to you now... with all the digging they've been doing and soforth, they can really trash the tank from time to time. I smooth out my sand almost everyday now, because if I don't everything is laying all over the place and the water bowls wont be level. I wouldnt see a problem with leveling it off. I can also always hear them digging around. I really wonder whats going on, somebody needs to invent a clear sustrate.