Artemis, Day 14 carrying eggs

[mjjluver]

awww!
what will you do if you have hundred that make it? is there someone near you that can help out?

[Giner13]

Oh my


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[GotButterflies]

All of that....AND...you still make time to keep us updated to the very last detail! You are amazing! Great job!! Thank you!!

[mlakers]

awww!
what will you do if you have hundred that make it? is there someone near you that can help out?

Ummmm...get a bigger tank? I really don't know. I don't think getting a hundred to land is even possible, given how other attempts have worked out. I'd be thrilled if I ended up with a handful. But if I do get a big number to land, I guess I'll scramble and do my best to make it all work. I've been thinking through possible scenarios but really not sure what I would do with a blizzard of babies in the short term. Long term, I would share them with other established crabbers who would agree to track their growth and behavior over time.

[mlakers]

All of that....AND...you still make time to keep us updated to the very last detail! You are amazing! Great job!! Thank you!!

You are very welcome! It's so nice to have a space where people understand the magnitude of the undertaking. I'm pretty sure everyone in my real life just thinks I've gone slightly mad and are waiting patiently for it to pass.

[mlakers]

Day Nine.

Everything looks good this morning. They survived me going out to dinner.

I did have one very scary episode right before leaving. I was trying to get a 50% water change done quickly before we left, and it's been super cold here for late August/early September (43 degrees at night--a new record) and we refuse to turn the heat on in what is officially still summer...so the saltwater I mixed has been really cool at room temperature. I didn't have time to let it warm in the 83-degree bath, so I warmed some in the microwave, let it rest, and then mixed with the water for the jars but just gauged the temp by feel, and I think it was a tad warm. I saw no movement in that one jar after adding the warmer water. I was certain I had killed them all. So frustrated and mad at myself. I almost dumped the whole jar before leaving, but didn't really have time and decided I would do it after I got back.

Well, good thing I did wait because when I went to do the 100% before-bed water change, there were still a bunch alive in that jar! Whew! There were a good number of dead, so clearly I had overheated the water, but probably at least fifty hardy souls survived, so that made me feel slightly less horrible.

This morning I saw a few brine shrimp swimming around in one of the jars. I added a lot of eggs last night, so I though I would see more this morning, but then I looked close at the zoea bellies and they were crammed, bulging with pink, so I think it's safe to say they are eating the artemia. THAT is a load off my mind and will hopefully make the feeding process easier for me and more healthful for the babies.

[GotButterflies]

Whew! What a close call!

[mlakers]

DAY NINE. Orange bellies filled with brine shrimp.

Pretty uneventful day in the crab nursery. Got a little warm in there (86 degrees Fahrenheit) which worried me, but I opened a window in the room and the temps went down a few degrees. I loaded them up with food at seven am (maybe too much, because I ended up doing a double water change for two of the murkiest ones when the ammonia read as in the "stress" zone. But I could definitely see the brine shrimp swimming and the larvae were eating them up as fast as they could. Their bellies were stuffed with orange shrimp. Some of the zoeae has turned bright orange, too.

I did a rough population count tonight when I did the squeaky-clean overnight 100% change. It's a very rough estimate and sometimes I lost my place or just got distracted in the count. It is SO hard to count wriggling, tiny, semi-transparent zoeae that number in the hundreds and are intermingled with brine shrimp egg casings, sand, and other general detritus of food and waste.

So the data is absolutely APPROXIMATE and extremely RAW and I haven't had a chance to think about what it all means. It's a starting point, only. Turns out the numbers of zoeae in the jars are wildly divergent, but I didn't even try to portion them when I separated them into jars. I mean, I did, but only by turkey-basterful, and that's not an exact science, obviously. So I don't even know at this point if the jars with more individuals are "more successful" or if they just had more to start with. I'll wait until tomorrow night's big change and do another count then and reassess the data to see what I think I want to do. I've also included some basic extra info about each jar.

Jar #1: ~430 zoeae at stage four. This jar is right beneath the bright, warm daytime heat lamp.
Jar #2: ~500 zoeae at stage four. This jar is closest to the heater.
Jar #3: ~ 180 stage four zoeae. This jar has low light, is near the heater, and is the one I overheated last night and initially thought I had killed them all.
Jar #4: ~150 stage four zoeae. This one is the farthest from any light source and farther from the heater.
Jar #5: ~350 stage four zoeae. This one has a low, 75 watt light on one side and is the farthest from the heater, but the light adds some heat.

So this is a total of roughly 1,610 currently live zoeae. I estimate that I saw about 80 dead, 50 or more of them in the jar that I accidentally overheated last night.

And now to try and relax for the next ten hours and forget all about these bajillion little living creatures in my care.

[Giner13]

Oh that's sooooo many!!! Kudos to you mlakers!!


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[GotButterflies]

Amazing ~ awesome job!!!!


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[daws409]

Keep up the great work!!

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[mlakers]

Thank you, everyone! I'm still expecting a population crash at some point. This hardly seems sustainable, even if I am feeding and cleaning regularly. In about an hour I'll do another count with the nightly water change.

Today, though, I saw a bunch of sheds in the water of several jars, so I think that means they are heading into stage five. One more to go, right?

[mlakers]

DAY TEN.

I'm now officially starting to get scared because it seems to be going so well. There has to be some bad thing around the corner, right? Brrr. I'm too superstitious, I guess.

Approximate population count for Day Ten:

Jar #1: ~410 zoeae, many at stage five. Maybe 20 dead.
Jar #2: ~500, maybe 5 dead (other bodies may have been eaten)
Jar #3: ~230 (must have under-counted yesterday), 8 dead.
Jar #4: ~125, no obvious bodies
Jar #5: ~325, maybe 20 dead?

So that is still 1,590 zoeae, give-or-take. Their bellies are obviously full and dark, their exoskeletons are getting nice and pink, and they swim really well and purposefully. I'll try to get some good pictures of stage 5 tomorrow. I'm just exhausted today, and feeling oddly emotional.

I had lunch with an older friend today (he's 83) and he was asking all about the babies so I was explaining why I'm doing this, how all hermit crabs are taken from the wild and many die after six months when they could live 40 years or more, how they are born in the ocean, go through six stages, and explaining my setup to him. He was very interested but a woman at the booth facing ours kept shaking her head and acting annoyed. Then she caught my eye and said, "Ugh. That is so disgusting." She was listening in, and mad because I was talking about the hermit crabs and (I guess?) spoiling her appetite. And I wasn't even talking about all the gross things they eat like moose poop and raw meat, but after her comment, I wished I had been. It made me strangely sad the rest of the afternoon, as it seemed to highlight the prevailing attitude and what these poor misunderstood creatures are up against.

Keep your fingers crossed for this venture. We need to change a lot of hearts and minds.

[GotButterflies]

Perhaps when she said that she was talking about how they are taken from the wild...

Never let other people rain on your parade! I know it's easier said than done~ but don't worry about what others think! You are doing amazing!

At what point will you put shells in?


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[mlakers]

Thank you. I am officially ready for the emotional roller coaster of this venture to stop. But! We still have a few more turns and the big drop to go.

I've had a few shells in the bottom of each jar for a few days already. Not really thinking they were ready, but just sort of as a promise and something for them to work towards. Animals are pretty aware of the resources available to them at any given time, so I just thought I'd show them a few shells. I've seen them swim near them and hover, so I'm not sure it's entirely ridiculous on my part.

However, once they hit the next stage I'll give them as many shells as I have, which at the moment is about 100 that I think are small enough (thank you, wolfnipplechips!). I also have people sending me shells, too (thank you, kuza!). Another crab enthusiast found some good miniature shells online at Richards Seashells and ordered me some. If that still isn't enough, I'll go to Michael's and get another bag of tiny shells to sort. Fingers crossed!