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Too Much Knowledge about Hermit Crabs

Too much knowledge about hermit crabs. I’m now into what kind of sand and how this and that sand is bad and what sand may be good and you have to prewash sand? How in the world do you prewash sand and get it to dry? Did you know play sand has metal filings in it because it is mined and it rusts and is now known to be bad for your hermit crabs? I found that on a message board after having read all weekend on many other boards and on many other websites how play sand was just fine to use.

70 pound bags of sand do not weigh 70 pounds. They weigh 180 pounds. At least. Right now it’s calcium carbonate substrate that’s in there, which is very expensive, about $6.00 for a little bag, and is good for the shells of hermit crabs, they need the calcium, but also can be bad for the crabs as the particles are sharp, especially bad for a crab that wants to moult. So I read about how good it is and many things about how it’s not good so now we have a bag of all purpose sand in the back room that we’ll dig into when it comes time in a month to change out the sand completely (the habitats require daily care, weekly sift cleanings and then a full redo every month) and mix with calcium carbonate substrate. In the meanwhile I hate to break the big bag open and stick a screwdriver in it to find out if it has metal filings, because then if it doesn’t we will have hanging around the back room for a month a full bag of sand with a hole in it and the prospect of that being a bad thing is high.

Marty put up the new bookshelves behind the futon and I labored for hours rearranging everything and we got the crab habitat installed on a shelf above the table. Sarah ran around happily, inspecting all the shells we supplied, found one she liked better and we had the privilege of seeing her make a transfer. Jerry inspected the new habitat then did his usual thing of going to the back and hiding while Sarah continued to roam. Marty says he did witness Jerry climbing. I haven’t. As far as I can tell, they don’t seem to like the coconut fiber wall we have at the back of the tank. We were told they’d love that but so far even Sarah is snubbing it.

I’m going to take a break for now from learning about hermit crabs.

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Juli Kearns

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11 responses to “Too Much Knowledge about Hermit Crabs”

  1. Jennifer Avatar
    Jennifer

    Your crab saga (welcome to Sarah and Jerry by the way)reminds me of my turtle years. What started out sounding so easy, ended up with me having a 120 gallon tank, and lots of maintenance. It was fun, just not as easy or cut and dried as I had been led to believe. Same thing happened with out “free” lizard. But, she seems to be thriving.

    Your commentary about sand makes me think of Grizzled… Grizzled knows way too much about sand.

    Reply
  2. Idyllopus Avatar
    Idyllopus

    Well, we’ve gone about as far as we’re going to go for these crabs, with the exception of adding more shells and shade. If they do live and if they then live and live and get large enough to require more space, they will be finding another home.

    At present, we’ve given these the optimum environment prescribed and they’re being very inactive so I’m not sure they’re going to do well.

    Reply
  3. Jennifer Avatar
    Jennifer

    Maybe you got sloth crabs by mistake. 🙂

    Reply
  4. Idyllopus Avatar
    Idyllopus

    Scaredy crabs.

    Reply
  5. SnapFish Avatar
    SnapFish

    I’ve kept LH Crabs for 5 years plus, and they live in playsand. I admit it’s not ideal, but they take about 1 hour of my time a day, and I think they have it pretty good. 😀 If the chosen sand is too expensive you hesitate to throw it away after a month or so. Washing sand sounds like a herculean effort to me. I wish there was a better substrate for them. I do try to stay away from the brand that smells like oil. They have survived 5 years on the playsand, being thrown away and replaced once a month.
    Sometimes the crabs are lethargic at first, after purchase. The pet stores/distributors have put them through it, and they need some down time.
    I have 6 caribbeans, 3 Ecuadorians, 1 Brevy, 1 Rugosus(a very bad boy) and a Perlatus that I’ve had for almost 5 years. She is very small, and a beauty. She has her own 5 gallon, when it’s molting time.

    Reply
  6. SnapFish Avatar
    SnapFish

    Ok, let me rephrase that. 😮
    “They (the crabs) have survived 5 years on the playsand. My routine includes the playsand being thrown away and replaced once a month.”
    It’s hard to find something better than playsand, for me.
    I will admit the Ecuadorians are not fond of the sand, but they are tricky business in the crab world. The E’s are the most sensitive, & hard to care for, if you ask me. They are delicate and nervous.

    Reply
  7. Idyllopus Avatar
    Idyllopus

    Snapfish, at the end of the month we’re planning on shifting over to the play sand with perhaps a bag of the expensive sand thrown in with it. And the coconut stuff.

    I think you’re right and that they’re recuping.

    Reply
  8. SnapFish Avatar
    SnapFish

    I was in a large national petstore chain, yesterday, buying some shells. For some reason this store has alot of peth turbos, and I can usu. find what I want. There was a woman there with her 2 small kids, and she was returning a dead crab to the store, that they had sold her. She was demanding a replacement. I had about three minutes with her, trying to help her. It was impossible. I kept thinking “Where do I send her on the internet for help?” Every website I see makes crabkeeping too complex or too easy. Mostly websites imply that doing 1+2+3 will result in 100% survivability. It really often depends upon what the crab went thru long before you ever bought them. Distributors are careless or worse. I finally gave up, and told her to read alot of sites, to get a broader opinion. Its such a complicated thing to explain, and three minutes was not enough. I felt like I let her down, but geez. She was buying a humidity gauge, so I felt like she was on the right track, though. A message board is the best way to learn, but which one?
    Sorry I just got upset about this yesterday. So felt I did a bad job, in my three mintues. Oy.

    Reply
  9. Idyllopus Avatar
    Idyllopus

    Directing her to look through internet sites is about all you can do and I imagine she appreciated your efforts.

    A problem is with the way that they’re sold. When we purchased our crabs, we were given no information, no talk about humidity or the importance of a gauge, diet etc., and the habitat we were sold was inadequate. So we studied and returned the next day and got a different habitat and returned again a couple days after that for some other things we realized would be beneficial. We’ve done what we can and at this point how the crabs fare is going to have much to do with the condition they were in when we got them.

    The information on the net can be confusing, especially when it is conflicting. But at least it does get across that there is more to keeping hermit crabs than what is implied at the pet store.

    Reply
  10. SnapFish Avatar
    SnapFish

    Thanks. See— you are the kind of person who does well with LHC. You do research. You recognize the pet stores are lying. Like you say, I did help the woman a bit. After all she did not know me, and where I live- people don’t just swan up and talk to strangers. It’s considered odd behavior.
    If she is on the internet, she is in better shape than most crab owners. Many people don’t think of going to the internet for help w/LH Crabs-until much later. It took me about 3 months to get up to speed when I first started keeping LHC. Knowing how/where to pick a healthy crab is key. My guys are so smart now. We get Santa Ana winds-desert winds. The humidity drops, and my little Einsteins dump their own water dishes to keep the humidity at 70%. They have learned that they can run their own tank-and not wait for lazy me. 😀
    (Caribbeans with brains.) Now if they could just learn to replace their own sand.

    Reply
  11. Idyllopus Avatar
    Idyllopus

    That is funny that they flip over the waterdish to create humidity for the tank.

    Ours is doing a great job of maintaining humidity…with regular mistings and sponges.

    Reply

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