New Aussie crabber with 1 dead, 1 buried and 2 unknown crab

Questions about unexpected problems.
pkoo
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Re: New Aussie crabber with 1 dead, 1 buried and 2 unknown c

Post by pkoo »

Hi Guys, Good news or not???... It's been 4 weeks since any evidence of life of my buried crab Sunset was seen. So reluctantly and carefully my kids and I dug it up. We search the whole tank and discovered it in the last 3 square inches of the tank. We were expecting the worst since Sunset had been bought along with another crab that had already died from a pet shop with very poor conditions. But when I scooped it up on a tablespoon, surprise, surprise... Sunset was alive!! I was shocked and a bit paralysed with indecision should we rebury it, had we dug it up too early? We'd dug up almost the entire tank to find it and the substrate and ornaments were in total disarray. After considering for a couple minutes and with my kids urging me on, I decided to move it to the main tank. His outer shell felt hard, he didn't appear to have any signs of moulting. He was just sitting on the spoon twiddling its antennae. Was that what he'd been doing for 4 weeks? Anyway when I placed him in the main tank he went straight into the hide but later went exploring around the food dishes. Not sure if he's eaten but he looked like he'd had a bath. So what do people think? Dig I did him up too early? Should I have put him back into the iso tank and rearranged the decor? Was the inactivity in the iso tank just Sunset de-stressing, moulting, unhappy about the environmental conditions or lonely?
Last edited by pkoo on 27 Oct 2012, 22:11, edited 1 time in total.
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Wai
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Re: New Aussie crabber with 1 dead, 1 buried and 2 unknown c

Post by Wai »

What has been done has been done, so don't go digging him up again. We all get anxious and dig them up (I admit doing so too on a few occasions), but it is best to leave them alone unless they have been buried for over two months. If they've been down for four months, then they may have died.
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pkoo
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Posts: 27
Joined: 25 Sep 2012, 22:39
Gender: Female
Hermit crabs: 0
Total gallons: 0
Total tanks: 0
Location: North Western Sydney

Re: New Aussie crabber with 1 dead, 1 buried and 2 unknown c

Post by pkoo »

Thanks Wai. I'll wait longer next time.
Another question I had was: what happens if a crab buries itself in the main tank? I've read that moulting crabs should be placed in an iso tank or have a makeshift iso container such as a soda bottle placed around it if housed with other crabs. But how do you know where a crab has buried itself and whether it's planning to stay down for a week or a month or more for a moult? We seriously had to search the iso whole tank to find Sunset.
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Wai
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Re: New Aussie crabber with 1 dead, 1 buried and 2 unknown c

Post by Wai »

That's the hard part with the bottle method... it's easier said than done. Quite often we don't know where they buried in the first place, so there's not much you can do besides hoping they don't get attacked. If you do know where they are, then carefully slip the bottle in so that the crab is in the middle. There has been a case where someone accidentally sliced a fresh moulter in two with the edge of the bottle.
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