HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I am havinga HUGE fruit fly problem in my crabitat. My crabs are suffering they are not active at all. Only in the wee hours of the night and I only see that when I come home from a party on the weekends. I haven't been able to feed them fresh fruit or anything bc I'm scared of the flies coming. I've just been feeding regular FMR even though I know its bad, I just don't know what to do.
Today I put up that jar with the bag inside filled with wine, I did it like an hour ago but there SEEMS TO BE EVEN MORE FRUIT FLIES!!!!!!!!! They are EVERYWHERE!!! I have no idea what to do. I'm going to change the substrate tm, do you think that will be enough? I am getting really frustrated and I feel AWFUL for my making my crabs live like this. Do you think its causing them a great deal of stress?? Please help I'd appreciate any advice.

I'd take everything out(substance, toys, food), clean the tank and everything you take out(you can renew the substance instead of cleaning it), kill any flie you see..

Wait! Do you have a lid? I don't see how they'd get in w/ a good lid that has smaller openings.

First...calm down

Ok, now change the substrate, use sand if you are using EE or FB. If there isn't any "fruit" or other fresh food in there, I don't see how there should be fruit flies. Maybe there is a piece under the substrate somewhere you can't see. Where do you live? In a house, apartment, school dorm? Maybe the flies are coming from somewhere else. They only live for 24hrs and must have a food source to live and lay eggs. Changing the substrate should work. Make sure there isn't any super ripe or rotting fruits laying around in the kitchen(or your room), or they will just come back.
I only get them when I leave food in too long, and as soon as I take it out, they are gone.

Try putting the food in at like midnight and taking it out at 6am. That should be long enough for them to eat and it's not sitting in there waiting for the fruit flies.

Good luck, hope I helped

I have a fruit fly problem too.....only until recently I had four crabs down, and I could do nothing. At the moment, I have one more crab finishing up a molt....

I haven't found that the flies are too much of a problem except as an annoyance. I've never seen them on the crabs or in their shells, and they're usually sitting on the glass.

So I'm eagerly awaiting the return of Firenze so I can finally clean the tank and get all those flies out!! Word tot eh wise though: don't clean your tank out with diluted vinegar to get rid of the flies! We use vinegar to trap the fruit flies, and they really seemed attracted to it....

Fruit flies live for longer than 24 hours, 37 days is normal (don't ask me why exactly 37 days...).
It might be that the trap has drawn fruit flies from hiding places and other rooms in your house. So before you clean the tank, check that there are no flies anywhere else and that the crabitat is really the main source. I use mosquite netting to make the ventilation openings of my terrariums fruit fly-safe and it works quite well.

I have sand, and we have flies too. Try using only dry food for a bit they will go away. Everytime I put the wet food, or fresh veggies or fruit in there they come back. I guess its just that time of year. I have a lid and a light, and a towel but they still get in. I went thru and cleaned the tank top to bottom and 3 weeks later they came back. Its very irritating.

I had fruitflies come with my last adopted tank, they crabs didnt seem to really care about them..and they flies didnt have any interest in the crabs...just the FB.

I cleaned everythingout and got new FB and there are none.

Just make sure to take the tank outside and then opening it and take everyting out, or they get out into the house and will likely come back. If you cant do that, the wine will work (or whisky...they like that too especially Wild Turkey-my dads)

Well I took out the substrate and put in more. Like an hour after I hung the fruit fly jar trap filled with wine in the tank, THERE WAS TWICE AS MANY MORE! So I said that is it and cleaned out the substrate and replaced with new coconut fiber. Do you all think the coconut fiber is the problem?? I really don't like sand I feel like my crabs like the FB so much better. But if that is what it takes I guess I will have to make due.
So anyways I put the trap next to my tank. And I was just looking in there this morning and there was only one fruit fly. What the heck?? Hopefully the trap NEXT to the tank not IN the tank will attract the fruit flys OUT of the tank. I'm hoping. If not I'll just wait til winter!!!

37days!!

I don't know where I got 24hrs from , I guess I just always thought that.

Sorry, anyway, I just read and article that they mutated some gene in the fruit fly and doubled their life span!!! They said some of them were actually living for 110 days!!

I wonder who paid for that study

Coconut fibre substrate seems to be attractive for many (harmless!) bugs since they can eat it and it's so moist. But fruit flies need to lay their eggs on, well, fruit, so I don't think that the EE is the main problem here, I guess it's just the warm weather that makes the conditions ideal for fruit flies.

Nicoleh86 wrote:So anyways I put the trap next to my tank. And I was just looking in there this morning and there was only one fruit fly. What the heck?? Hopefully the trap NEXT to the tank not IN the tank will attract the fruit flys OUT of the tank. I'm hoping. If not I'll just wait til winter!!!

When you put out the wine trap, did you put a drop of dish soap in as well? This disturbs the surface tension and makes them drown rather than dining finely on your wine and flying away again.

OHHHHH no I didn't thanks!!