EMERGENCY!!!!!!!!!!

[POPPIT]

I think my girl Seven came up after over 4 weeks but with no shell!!!!...Is this a common thing?...I have no clue where she came up or where her shell might be...She has definitely moulted as she is lighter and hairy and possibly a bit soft still...I suspect that Gonzo (who has been tunnelling everywhere) might have found/disturbed her and possibly even pulled her out of her shell...I removed her from the tank and grabed some shells about her size and i did put her in a salt pool so some of the sand would come off...I left her in the igloo home (removed from the main tank) with some shells and covered her while i finished setting up the iso...she didnt go in a shell so i put her in the iso tank with everything she needs except her original shell...I am so worried about her...oh she lost both rear legs too so obviously a difficult /stressful moult?

[emmac350]

Dip the shells you're offering her in saltwater - it'll make them seem more desirable (as if a crab was living in them until very recently). Offer her lots of protein and calcium - meat and either shrimp/krill/plankton or eggshells and cuttlebone. If she didn't get to finish her exo she'll need to get the nutrients from other places.

[POPPIT]

When i looked a bit ago she was still naked but moved a shell out the way and dug a bit of a grove to sit in..she is inside the igloo just sitting there but alert...I wish i could dig for her shell but i have 2 crabs down plus Gonzo who went down again yesterday(think i can see his cave)..I hope Seven makes it...I will check on her again now...She hasn't changed shells since i got her so maybe she just likes her shell...Poor girly...I didn't wet the shells as i was trying to avoid sand from getting all in them before she put her possibly soft body in...I don't wanna lose her or any of them...I lost my last 3 crabs to moult and pps so im pretty concerned...The food i gave her had calcium in it..If she is alive in the morning i will add shrimp, eggshell and cuttlebone to boost her nutrient intake...Thanks

[POPPIT]

Seven is hanging on for dear life....So i check her this morning and she is clinging to the edge of the salt pool with maybe half or less of her body submerged i open the lid with plans to put the shells in the salt water like emma suggested...but when i lifted the lid Seven fell backwards into the water unmoving...i got her out and she was barely alive(she could of been stuck in that pool for hours!!!)...I managed to get her half way in a turbo shell as i thought this might help her...I decided she might have gotten cold sitting in that water so i decided to put her in an emergency accommodation up in the shell shop(part of a bathroom corner shelf unit)where the environment is what she is use to(shell shop is new and neither Gonzo(buried atm) or Neelix has gone up there yet)..I held her in the shell so she wouldn't tip out while i was making room for her igloo home and i did see more claw movement from her...She is very weak and her eyes are pale...I might lose her...She has lost the last leg on one side and the second leg on the other side during her moult...

[aussieJJDude]

Maybe try putting olive oil around the lip of the shell. Unfortunately; the lack of willingness to choose a shell is a sign of her weakness - she is unable to hold onto it. Even though many of us don't recommend hand feeding; try hand feeding her strips of her favourite foods (if not: I suggest prawns, crab meat, mango ect) and make sure she has honey and calcium (not to mention water) in an easy reach. If she starts eating out og your hand; there is a faint hope that she may do a 180.

*fingers crossed*

[POPPIT]

She didn't make it...She was barely able to move when i put her in the emergency accommodation i put food under her and left her alone hoping it was stress and she might perk up.

[appps]

:-(. Sorry to hear that

[emmac350]

Don't mix 'food' and 'shells' with crabs. Olive oil smells like food, so a crab will come to it looking for food, not shells. I'll have to dig around to find the link to the study (I posted about it on here somewhere) but scientists did a study about this...went kind of like this:

Scientists set up 2 pits on a beach. One had food items (dead fish, snails, fruits, etc.) and one had empty shells in it. As crabs approached the pits, they picked the crabs up and put them in a bucket, transferring them to the OTHER pit (i.e. crabs who were looking for food got moved to the shell pit and vice versa). Crabs 100% of the time did NOT want the item in the pit they were moved to and actively escaped and went back to the other one.

What this means is that a crab looking for a shell won't go to food smells and a crab looking for food doesn't want to be shown shells. Saltwater in a shell makes it seem like it was recently discarded - recently enough that there's still shellwater in the shell - and proves that the shell is whole because it can hold water. That's why we recommend giving shells a dunk (or boil) in saltwater to try to get your crabs interested in them again.

[emmac350]

Study is http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/31261 if you're interested.

My earlier post about it:



Re: Cursed?

Postby emmac350 on 04 Jan 2010, 05:28 pm
CJ - a quick reply to your question about crabs and snail shells. I've been poking around on Google Scholar, reading what I can (and using Google to help me with what I don't understand) about land hermit crabs. The article I'm referring to is located here. Wait a second - last time I looked at it, it was free! No fair! I remember a good deal of it and apparently my computer saved it, so I'll be going off of that. (If you can see it, I'm discussing from page 179.

Seems that marine hermit crabs are attracted to dead/dying snails for shells, but land crabs are not. Land hermit crabs respond to dead/dying snails as a food source, not a shell source. They base their 'why they are attracted to the item' analysis based off of how the crabs responded to a clean shell placed in their midst (length of shell-change cascades, fondling each others' shells in an exploratory manner) and how they responded when the source of the attractant was removed (i.e. remove crabs from the pit and place them in bucket - do they respond to shells or food?).

Other interesting note from this study is it found that crabs with 'shells on the mind' (crabs that were attracted to dead crabs of the same species) will not respond to new food placed in their midst, nor will they respond to the dead crab as food. They ignore all sensory inputs other than shells. Conversely, crabs who didn't have 'shells on the mind' tended to not even respond to a new shell. This could have something to do with the fact that they would go for shells if their shell was broken/ill-fitting, but if their shell was comfy they'd go for food and not bother trying for a new shell that may fit less well.

[POPPIT]

I didn't put oil or anything on the shells (i personally hate the feeling of oil on my skin) just put them in the salt pool but Seven was too weak...Thanks for the information though.