HCA: Hermit Crab Association

I have two crabs, and both of them have been down for the last couple of weeks. This is the first time that they've been under simultaneously, which makes watching the crabitat a bit boring for me, but they've each molted several times under my care, so I know the routine. What's piqued my curiosity this time is something that I hadn't seen before in any previous molt.

One of them has made his "molting cave" (or what I presume to be such) at the front of his enclosure, and not only has he dug to the very bottom of the sub, he's done so close enough to the glass that there's a small gap in the sand through which I can see a portion of his shell and one of his legs. I'm obviously not going to try and "fix" the sand, partly because I don't want to risk collapsing it on top of him and partly because I don't know where the other crab has settled down there, but I've been wondering if this should be a cause for concern on my part. Since their enclosure is in a room that has windows and experiences a natural day/night cycle, is there a chance that the lack of 100% darkness could pose a problem?

It's hard for me to tell exactly which of the two crabs this is. If it's the one that I think it is, this would be his fourth or fifth molt under my care, and I figure he knows what he's doing (if it's the other, it would be his third). I've considered putting something against the glass to block the light and keep him in darkness, but I also wonder if it's too late for that if this does pose a problem. I've also considered the possibility that this isn't a molt and he just feels like burying himself for a while.

Have any of you ever experienced something like this? If so, how did it turn out? This is a bit of a new one for me.

Crabs will sometimes do that, and give us a 'window' to see what they are doing. In the ten years I have had my crabs, it has only happened twice for me.
Your instinct to cover the window so that he has darkness is correct. If he isn't molting and doesn't like your window covering, he will jsut move. If he is molting, the darkness is a good thing!

Oh, I never cover the windows anymore. If they want darkness they can move.


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Hahaha really Joe?? That's funny! Maybe if it happened a few times, I would be like 'meh, do whatever you want'. It has probably been years since mine made a window tho!

JoeHermits wrote:Oh, I never cover the windows anymore. If they want darkness they can move.


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Bahahahaha!

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I used to cover them, and I did it for years, but somewhere along the timeline I snapped and decided that they didn’t need to be babied. They know how to dig.


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Update:

One of the two crabs came back up earlier in the week, and he's just as active as always. I know now that the crab who made the window (the one who's still down) is the older of the two, and while I did cover the glass after my original post, I took a brief peek just to satisfy my curiosity. He's still alive down there, and I can see bits of shed exo near him--which is really cool, since I've never seen that before. If his previous molting schedule holds, he should be back up soon.

I hope that it's soon, anyway: I have the upgrade bug something fierce right now. I want to move them to something a bit taller to give them some more climbing room, and the bigger of the two is right on the cusp of 6" of sub no longer being sufficient, so I want something that can accommodate more without further restricting the available above-ground space. I have all sorts of ideas for new decorations and arrangements thereof, and I want to move them both at once. It looks really cool in my head, at any rate.

Moving them one at a time is a valid option, if that makes you feel any better.


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My crab did this too! I really liked being able to see him underground, it was cool.