my tarantula's crickets

crazycrabber · Post by **crazycrabber** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 4:52 am

I was wondering what kind of hunters hermit crabs can be. They eat meat and can be cannibals and have pinchers, so they can hunt right? my tarantula isn't eating his crickets right now, so i think he is getting ready to molt and will remove the crickets. my hamster, cat, and fish would catch them. fish, if i dropped it in the water. but i am so curious about what a hermit crab would do about a cricket right in front of it. these ones i got from the yard, so i am not going to use these ones, but next time i get some from the pet store i will give it to the crabs also if it is okay to do that.

finalfantasyxii · Post by **finalfantasyxii** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 1:46 am

They are garbage eaters, not hunters. In my experience, the only crickets they eat are already dead!

Crabber85 · Post by **Crabber85** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 2:32 am

Yeah final fantasy is correct hermitcrabs wont go after a living meal unless its one of their own kind because hermitcrabs are opportunistic scavengers they will only eat their normal food if its dead ie rotting fish and other marine life that has washed ashore.Some of us here have done experiments with live food before and in all cases the hermitcrabs just ignored the crickets or meal worms until they were dead its just the way they are biologically programmed.

Laurie LeAnn · Post by **Laurie LeAnn** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 2:52 pm

If there is ANYTHING in my crab tank other than my crabs, they freeze up and will not MOVE!

jenok · Post by **jenok** » Tue Sep 16, 2014 5:03 am

For some reason I was thinking that on occasion if a crab can catch it they would eat it. I thought I remembered someone saying they would occasionally eat pill bugs/roly polies/isotopes when they were kept in the tank for cleaning up the crabs messes. But it's been awhile back so maybe that wasn't right or maybe they just saw them eating a dead one?