HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I am a brand new hermie Mommy as of last Friday. I have two meduim-ish sized PP's who are named Hermione and Ginny (yup after the Harry Potter characters...wow I am a dork). Anyways I have never owned hermit crabs before but I am absolutely in love with them!!!

I am so glad for all of the information I am finding on these forums. I did a lot of net research before I bought my hermies but now I am really taking advantage of the wealth of information available here and on the many other hermie sites.

Beware..this is a long post with lots of possibly boring (to you) details about my crabbies...so turn back now if you don't want to read my novel of a post.

A little bit about my crabitat...

I have a 10-gallon tank (hoping to upgrade to a 25 sometime soon, $$ permitting) with Calci-Sand substrate (going to be switching to mixing this with coconut fiber though) and a bottom-mounted UTH. I have a plastic cereal bowl serving as my hermies' pond and I am using Doc Wellfish (and dechlorinator or couse) to make their saltwater. The pond has 2 sea sponges in it for humidity and life preserver purposes. I have a smaller bowl with regular dechlorinated water in it which has a reptile "cave" over it to make a little grotto. They have a large piece of Cholla wood and a little ladder (the kind meant for birds) set up as a climbing peak. They also have a little decorative plastic plant, a wet food bowl, a dry food bowl, a bottlecap filled with honey and 4 empty shells. I have a thermometer/hygrometer and right now with the heat wave I have a screen lid on the tank. The temp and humidity are both steady at 80 and I have a fan blowing over the top of the tank to keep the humidity in check. Obviously the UTH is not plugged in right now. Well...that's my crabitat.

My crabbies....

Hermione is shy and very cautious about being picked up (especially now, but more on that in a minute) and Ginny is the troublemaker (there's one in every family right? ). She is obsessed with escaping from everything (her bathtub during bathtime, her drying-off box after bathtime, her crabitat, us) and is not below standing on Hermione to try to do it! They both love thier Cholla wood and spend the majority of their time hanging out there (in fact they eat more of that than their normal food I think). Ginny is a real climber [she loves clambering up my arm but gets turned upside down around my elbow (not that it stops her)] and Hermione is more introverted and skiddish.

My crabbies are currently still adjusting to their new home and are a bit skiddish (understandably), they are also obsessed with escaping thier crabitat (does that ever stop and is this normal??). I am feeding them a wide variety of foods including commercial hermie food, organic baby food (just carrot so far), nori, bloodworms, honey, sunflower seeds, dried apricots, dried papaya, flax seed, coconut, cuttlefish bone, spinach, and cherries. So far the only thing they seem to be interested in at all is the honey, but I have many more ideas to try (in part, thanks to this site).

We have had one traumatic event already in my short motherhood. Hermione was being taken from the tank by my girlfriend on Saturday and slipped off her hand onto the carpeted floor.

I was so worried!!!! It's been about 4 days and she seems ok but I was terrified the fall would have ruptured her organs (it was from a height of about 4 feet and our carpet isn't thick). After that scare we have been getting along pretty well though (although Hermione is naturally a little more skiddish now). As long as nothing that that happens again I think I will be a happy hermie Mommy!

So anyways I will try to be active on this forum and get some pictures of my babies up soon!!

Welcome to the HCA . They will try to escape, make sure the lid is on tight. I'm impressed with the sound of your set up for a new crabber . Sounds like you are off to a great start. The only advice I have is if you think this is going to become an addiction (as it has for many of us ) save up for the biggest tank you have room for. I started with a 10 gal moved to a 20 long then I got a 55 gal and now I have a 75 gal and getting ready to set the 55 back up . They are just to darn cute . Everything you are doing sounds great, the only thing I would check is your commercial food if you haven't already. Some have bad ingredients, you can find a safe commercial food list over to the right under Crab Care FAQ ---------------->. NarNar sells food on eBay (The Happy Hermit Crab is her store) and my crabs LOVE her stuff, sometimes I think they lick the bowl clean . We love pictures so post away!

Welcome to the HCA! MomToDixie said it all, just wanted to second the encouragment to post photos. I (I mean we) LOVE crab photos.

welcome! If Hermione seems to be okay, I wouldn't worry about it. my largest crab has been dropped from a height of four feet down to tile twice (yes, I sound like a bad crabby mom, one was my sister however), and he is just fine, although he did act very stunned at the time.

Caroline

Sounds like you have made a great start! Great supplies for a beginner. Good job! Well, the thing about dropping a crab is that you only let it happen once. My mom dropped my crab--about the same scenario. Mine did fine for a while but didn't make it through his next molt, but don't let that scare you because his death was definitely bacterial, not structural. The fresh foods you are feeding are very good. Keep offering different foods. As they settle into their environment their appetites will improve. I've noticed w/ my guys that the SECOND time I feed them a new food is when they actually get brave enough to try it. Drizzling honey over a new food is a great way to encourage taste-testing (never do this unless you are sure it is a safe food).

Thanks for all the replies, advice and warm welcomes!!

The only advice I have is if you think this is going to become an addiction (as it has for many of us Embarassed ) save up for the biggest tank you have room for

I definetly want to invest in a large tank soon, especially since I really want to build a complete second level for my hermies.

the only thing I would check is your commercial food if you haven't already

I did check out my commercial food after reading some posts that mentioned the ill effect of preservatives and the like, and of course the one I got had all the bad stuff in it....go figure. So I am switching them to an all natural food diet. I made them a dry food of wakame, nori, pulverized cuttlebone, salt (Doc Wellfish's), oatmeal, dried coconut, sunflower seeds, flax seeds, bloodworms and a little corn meal (I know there's some debate over some kinds of meal being bad for Crabbies but it was on the safe food list on epicureanhermit.com so I am giving the corn meal a try). I am just introducing it to them tonight so hopefully they will like it (I know commercial foods have pheremones in them to attract the Crabbies but I haven't actually seen them eating any of the commercial pellets so hopefully they will switch to the natural food easily).

I gave them bloodworms yesterday for the first time and it's the only thing other than the honey that I've actually seen them really go for. Tonight I am trying them on cooked oatmeal (made with dechlorinated water of course) with honey and mango pulp in their "wet food" dish and I gave them a little bit of crab meat too....so we'llsee how that goes over. I am trying to get some spirulina to add to their diet but I have to make a jouney to the nearest health food store (which is an hour away) so it'll have to wait about a week.

I also bought them organic bananas, organic oranges and a coconut today...I'm going to freeze the extra coconut. The mango I got was sold already frozen (sold by Goya), and they also have passionfruit pulp (no extra ingredients, just the pulp), so that will be perfect for their little portions. I think I'm becoming an obsessive Mommy already!

my largest crab has been dropped from a height of four feet down to tile twice

It's so scary when it happens, but I am glad yours was ok and that gives me more faith that Hermione is ok!

Well, the thing about dropping a crab is that you only let it happen once

I hope that was the first AND last time it'll ever happen!!:oops: Also thanks for the advice on their eating habits!

just wanted to second the encouragment to post photos. I (I mean we) LOVE crab photos.

Well that's great to hear! It's tough to get good pics of them right now because they are never still for too long if I approach the cage or take them out for a little bit, but I did get a few pics of Ginny today so I will hopefully get those uploaded int he next couple of days.

Sorry for the long post and thanks again for the responses!

Oops...forgot to reply to this one other thing in my outrageously long reply:

They will try to escape, make sure the lid is on tight

Yeah, I have a dictionary sitting on top of the lid right now...just in case!!

Welcome, sounds like you have a couple lucky crabbies to have a such a great 'mom'! Can't wait to see pics.

Sounds like your getting of to a good start You also have very nice diet set up for them I'm sure there happy And like the above have all ready said...POST PICS lol


P.S Do you know what species they are?

Alright you all asked for pics. This is what I call "The Great Shell Swap: A Story by Ginny and Hermoine Narrated by their Mommy, DragonTear"

Here is Ginny in her original shell.


Yesterday Ginny decided to try out the new shell I bought for them. "Ooooh...roomy," says Ginny!


Here is Ginny strutting her stuff on the carpet in her new shell.


Evil Ginny!! Ginny asks..."Does my new shell bring out the red in my eyes?"


To be continued....

awww, Ginny is very photogenic!

Caroline

that last photo looks like she's crusty like right before a molt. anyone else think so?

Oh dear I hope that she's not getting ready to molt...I am so nervous about theri first molt....well and probably every molt but yeah...I am worried. If anyone else thinks she looks pre-molt please let me know!

Also this is really random but all of the buttons and images on this site are now invisible to me....the links are still there if I scroll over them but I can't see the images. Anyone know why that might be?

Thanks!

don't go by my comment. I can't seem to predict molts very well yet, but I'm trying to improve. Does she have black fingernails? Those indicate a recent molt has already occurred.

I agree with Jedi Sena, Ginny's exo looks quite ashy. but if you use sand, she could have had some on her, giving her the ashy look. don't worry though, I worried about my first molt too, but the first five (they all happened at once!) went just fine, and I'm sure yours will too.

Caroline