HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I got so amazingly lucky the other morning. I had finally put a bubbler pool in my pp's tank & was worried about one of them freaking out, getting all panicky & being unable to get out. Yes I have things for them to use to get out but w/it being new to them I was unsure of how they'd react. I checked in on them several times throughout the night & all was well. Now, an important part of this story is that my pp's aren't really big climbers. They love to climb the cholla, the log, a small piece of coral & up onto the cocohuts. They do NOT climb either kind of vines I have in there...the plastic leafy kind or the black bendy kind. That being said, it NEVER occurred to me any one of them would climb the tubing for the bubbler pool. I went in around 5am, looked around, did a head count & noticed one wasn't there. I assumed she had just dug down for the day like she does everyday. Just as I was about to walk away I looked up & to my horror saw Kirby just moments away from escaping! I shudder to think what the outcome would've been had I not looked up at the last minute. The hole the tubing goes thru is not right next to the part of the aquarium lid i'd removed for ventilation but apparently it's close enough. It turns out their long legs can reach over & ta-da...escape! Needless to say, I closed that hole up tight as a drum & made a hole for ventilation in an unreachable spot. I just thank God I caught her before it was too late!

I've had a couple E's grab onto the tubing, climb halfway up the tank and SLEEP there. They are excellent climbers. Good thing you caught the crab before she escaped!!

Another reason I LOVE aquarium hoods. They take into account for tubing, and have slits you can slip them into that the crabs can get out of.

Glad you found him in time. Animals are pretty remarkable on what they can accomplish.

If it had been my e's I never would have let it go but it was in my pp tank. My e's, like almost all other e's, go to great lenghts to climb as much & as high as they can. My pp's, on the other hand, aren't like that...or so I thought I guess Kirby decided it was time for me to eat crow! I love the aquarium hoods for the same reason. The 2 holes they put, 1 on either side, are just the right size for the tubing & are small enough that the crabs could never get out. Where I messed up was cutting out a part of the section they have sort of pre-cut, to remove so a filter can fit (when used as an aquarium), too close to the tubing hole. Oh well, you live & learn, plus nothing bad happened. You can bet I'll never make that mistake, or underestimate them, again!