Salt Water Question

[patriots]

I had a strawberry when I was a kid. (in 90s)
Now I have a purple pincher.

according to many experts,
strawberry needs salt water for 200%
and purple pincher is ok, but highly suggested to offer both mineral and salt water.

the thing which i get confused is...that i have never offered them salt water.

my strawberry was very healthy, molted well, and lived well without salt water.
also i used small pebbles for the substrate.

when I got my purple pincher-which is my first purple pincher-one seller told me to provide salt water and the other one told me pp doesnt need salt water.

since i had an expreirence with my old strawberry, i listened to the latter one's advice.
and, so far, my pp is healthy for about a couple of months.

so, long question short.
do pp and strawberry really need salt water to live?


or is there a certain type of hermit crabs which don't really need salt water to survive?


thank you.

[JoeHermits]

It’s difficult to say how well an animal does in captivity since things like stress and bodily health aren’t always easy to measure.

However, terrestrial hermit crabs of all species, including both strawberries and purple pinchers, have been found to be more active and live longer when given access to saltwater and proper digging substrate.

Strawberries have anecdotally seldom lived more than five years in captivity, so how helpful modern care techniques are is unknown, but purple pinchers have been recorded living more than forty.

Trust me, you’ll want to follow the care sheets.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[curlysister]

Totally agree with JoeH. I mean, they live where brackish water is available in their natural habitat, so it would only make sense to offer both. Dechlorinated water (using a product such as Prime) for the fresh water, and then mixing in a marine salt (such as Instant Ocean) for the salt water. The HCA believes that both are a necessity to have healthy hermit crabs.
As for substrate, small pebbles/ rocks would not provide a good envionment for molting. A crab needs to dig a tunnel and a cave which won't collapse, and stay down there for their entire molt.

[wodesorel]

How long did your strawberry live?

Edit: The double strength salt water myth was a thing for a while, because people were desperate to find any way to keep them alive in captivity. It made no difference, and because it is unnatural it hasn't been recommended in a long time.

[curlysister]

How long did your strawberry live?

Edit: The double strength salt water myth was a thing for a while, because people were desperate to find any way to keep them alive in captivity. It made no difference, and because it is unnatural it hasn't been recommended in a long time.

Thank you for clarifying - I didn't know what the OP was referring to as '200%'.

[Kydra]

I had purchased two boardwalk crabs (both PPs) and after reading here I got the largest plastic tank I could find as a temp solution until I was home. Only had freshwater for a while. Had a small UTH on the side and all EE mixed with Aquafina... as soon as I added a bowl of instant ocean, the one crab soaked in it for hours and later that night dug down in the then 2-3" EE and stayed down and molted successfully coming up after a little over a month.

I have read that the saltwater helps during molting for them to ditch the old exo and my above experience def confirmed that which is why I thought was worth sharing. Saltwater along with freshwater has more benefits than just this, but any help you can give for them to have a better chance at a successful molt seems like a pretty big deal to me so I'd definitely have some kinda marine saltwater available. Instant Ocean is relatively cheap esp for how long it lasts.

Just some more thoughts from research and experience.

[Motörcrab]

I would say all crabs need both types of water. I never see much water play from our purple pinchers but I do see them at both water types. They mostly reach in with their little pincher to drink or toe dip.

My strawberries on the other hand seem to prefer the saltwater. I have seen them completely submerged for several hours just hanging out. I don't see them at their freshwater pools drinking much.

I did recently change from the standard instant ocean to the reef Crystal mix. The reef mix has more calciums and trace minerals compared to the standard instant ocean.

Here are two pics of my straws in the saltwater pool.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk