Seaweed?

[Kermie16]

Question about seaweed for the hermies. Fresh seaweed off the beach I am assuming is fine? Also, when not at the beach, can I give them sushi grade dried seaweed? If not, then where would be the best place to buy dried seaweed?

[pandaincognito]

It can be dried seaweed. Always check the ingredients ^^ if it's completely organic it's good to go. I dont know about the sea weed off the beach :/

[hermitcrabcottage]

Dried seaweed is totally fine. As the last poster said- just make sure it's organic, dried seaweed with no other ingredients (it shouldn't be salted or have any herbs added). Most seaweed nori is good.

I'd assume seaweed gathered off of the beach is fine if you're in an area where there isn't a lot of pollution or 'people traffic' (aka- no sewage waste being added to the water nearby and no chance of people tracking something onto the seaweed by stepping on it). I gather seaweed straight from the ocean here in Alaska and dry it and store it- but I live in a pretty 'untouched' area, so I highly doubt any of mind would be contaminated. With that being said, make sure you're not gathering from a place where they may have used pesticides, herbicides, or artificial fertilizers nearby- as those can be toxic to crabs.

[CallaLily]

On collecting seaweed: please check your local laws! There are some places where it's illegal to remove plants, animals, shells, etc.

[Kermie16]

Thank you all for the great information! I will definitely check my local area law about collecting seaweed at the beaches. I never remove any wildlife from the beaches or anywhere else and I enforce the same teachings with my kids -Enjoy everything nature has to offer but respect it as well!!

[Jedi Sena]

laver and dulse are also good seaweeds.

[Kermie16]

A lot of the Asian bags of Nori I have under ingredients it just has seaweed. On the label, it has sodium like 170mg or something. Is that just natural sea salt? Or maybe just don't assume?

[pandaincognito]

Im not exactly sure. Hopefully someone else will chine in. But I think that sodium is from the seaweed itself. It does come from saltwater after all ^^ I have a question in regards to seaweed too. Agar agar is what exactly?? My work sells seaweed salad with agar agar....

[StayLoki]

A lot of the Asian bags of Nori I have under ingredients it just has seaweed. On the label, it has sodium like 170mg or something. Is that just natural sea salt? Or maybe just don't assume?

Im not exactly sure. Hopefully someone else will chine in. But I think that sodium is from the seaweed itself. It does come from saltwater after all ^^ I have a question in regards to seaweed too. Agar agar is what exactly?? My work sells seaweed salad with agar agar....

agar is a gelatin, derived from cellulose/plant material, most commonly algae!

"The gelling agent in agar is an unbranched polysaccharide obtained from the cell walls of some species of red algae, primarily from the genera Gelidium and Gracilaria. For commercial purposes, it is derived primarily from Gelidium amansii. In chemical terms, agar is a polymer made up of subunits of the sugar galactose." -good old wiki

Agar is most commonly used in cooking and baking for desserts,
but I also found agar interesting in my microbiology class, as it was used everyday in most labs, being the base of the petri dish! I inquired about it and we learned its actually indigestible for many organisms and in petri form is actually fortified with 'food' inorder for bacteria to eat and grow, therefor they arent actually eating the agar. ..that being said, the agar agar used for the nori is probably as a preservative or to keep it together if rehydrated and its natural at that, being derived from seaweeds and algea!!

sidenote: everytime I get sushi I break one up and give the hermies a peice of the crab or yellowtail and some nori to pick at.. obviously I trust my sushi place in that's its fresh, unpolluted fish and I wouldn't worry about the nori as a treat, the augar, or the salt content, unless it says 'enhanced' or 'flavored' with salt which are FDA terms to say it was added and not from natural content or resource.

as some have mentioned, I'd be more worried about 'the wild seaweed' being polluted or containing microscopic parasites or disease imo

[soilentgringa]

CallaLily already caught that, but I cannot stress enough the importance of being aware of your local laws regarding beach combing. Some beaches are protected, and even if some aren't, you can never be 100% sure that there aren't contaminants.
I'm working with an admin from another group right now; she's an MPA monitor at Monterrey (sp?) and is in the Navy and we are contacting a lot of different conservation and coastal authorities to find out what the stances are on removing shells from the wild, returning shells to the wild, impact on ecosystems and erosion, etc. etc. etc. There are a lot of ways that we impact the ecosystem of the animals that live in those areas, without even being aware.

/stepsoffsoapbox