New to crabbing and wanted to intro myself and the gang

[Onyxsun1]

My name is Kathy and I am fairly new to crabbing. My 17 year old son bought a couple of crabs when we went to the beach for Octoberfest. He got them in a tourist shop and we didnt pay too much for them. He was enthralled with them but couldnt bring himself to handle them much. He thought they would pinch. Anyway he named one Axel and the other Gear. We brought them home and two weeks later we couldnt find axel. My son found him under his gravel and dug him up. Later on both his claws fell off and he died the next day. I felt really bad and started researching crab care. I was mortified to find out that he buried himself to help in the healing process and to unstress. He paid the ultimate price for our stupidity. But now I know better. About a week later my son saw another crab in a pet store that was bigger than Gear so he bought him. He named him Clutch. My son still wont handle the crabs but I do. I think they are great little creatures. A couple of weeks later I purchased some fairly good sized crabs from a crab store as well as a book and some crab toys and a real good heater. I named the crabs Block and Piston. Do you see a recuring theme here? Well anyway they are all doing well at least for now. One thing I have noticed is that Clutch is ashen on his top part right above his eyes. He is active at night and likes to be misted. I am certain that his shell is too small but he refuses to change into a larger shell. There are several to choose from. I am hoping that he isnt putting off a moult for whatever reasons. I also havent figured out what kind of crabs I have but after reading that some types of crabs need salt water I went and purchased some stuff to make crab friendly salt water. Now every morning the salt water is almost gone and it looks like they arent even giving the other water a second glance. My crabitat hangs about 68 to 70 degrees and I figure I need another heater under the tank. The humidity seems to be staying at the right level but I am concerned about the temp. My crabs are in a 10 gallon tank with a glass lid. I am thinking of getting a larger aquarium for them but I want to first figure out how to keep the tank I already have warm without using a lamp. Anybody got any ideas? Anyway thank you for your time in reading my story and any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Wai]

Firstly, welcome Onyxsun1 to HCP Forum!

An undertank heater (known as UTH) will help keep your tank warm. Don't use bright lights as heat sources, because they confuse day and night time for hermit crabs. They are nocturnal, and continuous periods of light can cause them to be inactive.

Are you spraying your hermit crabs directly with water? I don't recommend that. Just spray the air in the tank with water.

Clutch may be going for a molt. Do you have an isolation tank ready to put him in if he does molt? If you don't know what an isolation tank is, here's the place find out on my site: http://www.hermit-crab-paradise.htmlpla ... limbs.html.

Thanks for joining, and keep checking back regularly for the news and events happening. Don't forget to play the games on this forum!

[Julia_Crab]

Hi!

A UTH doesn't necessarily do much to heat a crabitat because the wavelength of the heat doesn't spread too far through the substrate. So, first of all, you need to try to remove some of the substrate from the area directly over the heater. This will allow a bit more heat to rise up to warm the air in your tank.

I have a 120 gallon crabitat and I use heat and daylight lamps on it. Contrary to popular wisdom, if done properly, heating and lighting can be beneficial to crabs. I run 100 watts of reptile daylight incandescent day heat lamp, 15 watts of UVA/UVB fluorescent, and 25-70 watts of incandescent moonglow (depending on the temp of my house which is very cold in winter) in the daytime, which keeps my temp between 71.4 and 78 degrees on top of the substrate, and the air stays warm too. At night I run between 120 and 170 watts of moonglow, which keeps the air temp at 74.

I was having trouble with humidity until I added a TropicAire automatic mister. Now my humidity is hovering at 70 percent, and I'm thinking of adding a second one to bump it a little bit higher.

I have two 10 gallon ISOs in another room with a total of three crabs molting, and their UTHs don't do much to keep them warm, so I'm using a space heater, one of those parabolic dish heaters, to keep the temp at about 75. I bought two more crabs today and made an impromptu ISO out of a 5 1/2 gallon tank. I'm heating it with one ZooMed 1-5 gallon tank heater as a UTH, a second one on the back wall to the other side of the tank, and a 15 watt moonglow that I'm monitoring for temp and humidity.

The idea that crabs are nocturnal is not entirely true, it's just that keeping crabs is a relatively new phenomenon and alot of innovation needs to be done. Some species of crabs will wander around in the daytime, and it might be that they require UVA or UVB to have successful molts. I have four species of crabs, the eccies (c. compressus) and ruggies (c. rugosus) are semi-diurnal, and wander around all day and night, and even bask directly under the high wattage sun bulb. The strawberries (c. perlatus) and purple pincers (c. clypeatus) will only come out under the moonglow bulbs.

If done properly, overhead lighting can be beneficial for the crabs by simulating natural day/night conditions and feeding activity. It isn't something to be undertaken until you have a bigger crabitat for one, and until you've done some research on it. The Hermies group on Yahoo has a clever man named Bill, who will make recommendations for wattage to use based on your tank size and house temp.

But, in the interim, an easy thing to do is put a small UTH on one side of the back of your tank, with a thermostat on a probe to keep it from getting above 85 degrees on the glass. It will help warm your crabs a little. Putting a towel, or mylar space blanket, or styrofoam blocks around the outside of your crabitat will also help preserve some warmth. Or, just put a space heater nearby on low, and move it closer or farther away until you've adjusted it's distance for the best temp and humidity you can manage.

As to misting, it can be bad to mist your crabitat too much as you can cause bacteria and mold to grow. Some crabs don't like to be misted, and some do. One woman I know has 81 hermies and she mists her crabs daily, as she takes them out of their tanks to "play" in the baby pool gymnasium while she cleans their tanks. This is just to keep their gills moist while out of their proper environment. Some crabs really enjoy it; you can tell because they will hang out of their shells while you mist them and drink the water with their little mouth hands -- maxillipeds. Some species prefer not to be wet by you, like indos (c. brevimanus).

The point I'm trying to get to in my long, rambling discourse is that there are alternatives to the conventional wisdom about crab keeping. You need to try different things and find out what works for you and your crabs. As long as they are well-fed with a healthy, varied diet, have proper temperature and humidity, a comfy tank with toys and substrate, and salt and fresh water, you'll be able to work out a system that works best for you.

Good luck with your crabs -- I've been going only since October, and I'm hooked bad! 14 crabs and counting!

Kerie