HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I'm new here and I was wondering if it was just for land hermit crabs or both.

land, but maybe a few people know about aqutic

It's pretty much mostly for land hermits, but there are several members who also have marine crabs.

Hello!

I am 1 of the Few who Have Marine Hermies. I will say this, I do not know much about them, other than they are similar to LHCs in that they need Extra Shells and the right Conditions to Survive and Thrive.
They can be quite Beautiful. Almost Neon like Colorations

I want to setup a saltwater tank someday and load it with marine hermit crabs. I'd love to know more about them, for that future endeavor.

Are there any marine hermit crab boards out there? If not, maybe we should add a sub-forum on the HCA for marine hermit crabs.

Ive been thinking about setting up a salt water tank purely for marine hermits but, I figured that it would be more worth it to setup a marine tank and have marine hermits in it. I purchased the book "The Contentious Marine Aqaurist" because I was curious about the salt water hobby, it is a very good book and I recommend it to anyone considering setting up a salt water tank

How big of a tank do you have for your marine hermits OIF_VET ?

I second the notion of setting up another area in the forums specifically for Marine Hermies. I know I have them, I know I can find where to "Buy" Them on-line and I know that ther many species. Some will stay Teeny while others can get as Large as Large or even Jumbo.
I would imagine that the "Marine Tank would need to maintain a Specific Gravity and that Temps would need to be kept warm and that after a Tank is set-up U will need to feed them something (What? I do not really Know). I added some Marines to my existing Tank to help with Algae and that I dont need to feed them because ther is plenty of algae for them to eat.

I would not mind being the person to research the web about Marine Hermies, Providing Links and passing on the Knowlege I have learned in that Respect.

I really do think it be a Good idea to add a Forum for te Marine Owners.

im in favor to add some part of the hca for our aquatic friends i think it would make us the first fourm for both of them

With this in mind, I think folks here should be wary of at least one species that can somewhat be easily obtained in US tropical fish shops: Dardanus megistos -

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm ... cleid=2111

Here is another pic of one of them, though I have seen a bigger one in a pet shop:

http://www.magazine.noaa.gov/stories/im ... i-crab.jpg

From personal experience, they grow fast (one molt can increase in size from walnut to egg-sized if fed copiously - or if it has been eating tankmates), they grow big (imagine an underwater version of a cocounut crab in a giant conch shell), and they are super agressive against any and all tank inhabitants, including the undergravel filters and any aeration devices that can be perceived as living creatures/food.

The name "tank destroyer" comes to mind.

If you want one, just make sure that you only have this one critter in a very large tank and be prepared to take the cost of damaged filters or aeration systems (for all the precautions I've taken, in time mine always found a way to foul things up)...they can be very personable, too, just watch your fingers

Do you know if you could have them with sea snails or sea fiddler crabs?

I have seen that species in tanks of 40 gallons dedicated to them and maybe one or two Damsel fishes and they seemed like they were doing well.


I think it would be a great idea to add a section for marine hermits to the HCA it would be interesting to see how many members keep them.
This is a little bit of topic but, maybe there could also be a sub forum for fiddler crabs. The fiddler crab forum only has a few members and it takes a long time to get a reply, just a thought, sorry for getting of topic

Actually, I just tried to go to NarNar fiddler crab forum and apparently it has been removed due to violation of TOS (?).

So mabye there could be two new subforums to the HCA.

Silent Protagonist wrote:Do you know if you could have them with sea snails or sea fiddler crabs?

I have seen that species in tanks of 40 gallons dedicated to them and maybe one or two Damsel fishes and they seemed like they were doing well.

40 gallons for probably about a month. In time they can manage to snatch fast fish (I don't know how they do it...maybe like a trapdoor spider to crickets). I've been in fish stores where I see them eating small clown fish in their small corner of a large tank, about 20 + gallons (probably in the mistaken belief by the storeowners that these fellows are tank algae cleaners). Snails that stay on top near the water's edge virtually for long periods should have no problem, unless they start to venture down to the substrate into Dardanus territory.

And as for fiddler crabs, I think would probably be a bad idea to put them in the tank with the Dardanus m. unless you can construct an artificial shoreline that have the little guys out of the water most of the time. Then again, D. megistos have a nasty tendency to rearrange a tank...so I guess you have to keep it real sturdy to keep the shoreline from eroding due to the hermit crab's habits.

On a side note, the biggest one I ever saw (mentioned above) was actualy placed not in the display tanks of a pet shop but the backroom quarantine tanks where the shopkeepers put the pre-sale critters and live rock. I was offered about $20 bucks for it (I guess they never intended to sell it or something???) but I refused simply because of my early experience with one egg sized one which I had purchased as a walnut sized hermit. Ruined some filters real good...killed and eaten a larger Horseshoe crab that I had................

Mine eventually died, however, I don't know why...

It probably would've kept on growing if it lived on longer.

I was just wondering because along with my land hermits, I also have a 120gallon aquarium with hundreds of blue leg hermit crabs.

Crab_guru_11 wrote:I was just wondering because along with my land hermits, I also have a 120gallon aquarium with hundreds of blue leg hermit crabs.

Oh, those are cool. Usually they get along pretty well with other fish...great algae eaters I suppose and stay relatively tiny (I've seen them, never purchased them myself, however).