Crabber Since January!

[crabbyjo]

hyprmom, I haven't posted pics of my crabitat yet. I have had a hard time getting pics to even turn out. We have a wall of windows in front of the crabbies that put shadows & glare everywhere! So I took more today & am posting now.

A little update on our crab family. We now have 7 adorable crabs & we think all but 2 are molting. We missed our 3 molters in the iso so much that we bought 4 more crabs & put them in the new 40B. They all munched out for a few days & two seem to have completely disappeared. I have been watching one almost every evening but he/she is very shy but so darn cute. We named her Spot because of her pretty shell. All 4 new crabs came in the same kind of shells with different shades of brown spots. After I took pics today I noticed another newby up & moving around so maybe was only distressing!

Ok, a few pics.....
Spot


40B


From the top


A little info on the crabitat....The substrate is much deeper than it looks in the pic. It's about 7 inches at the deepest end. We have a shell shop up in the left hand corner in the pic above. Moss pit is in lower right hand corner in the pic above. I saw here at the HCA that someone had made a walking bridge out of hemp so I decided to do that. Haven't seen any of them using it yet but maybe they are while we sleep. We have lots of driftwood here so we cut some of that up for use in the crabitat after boiling & baking in the oven. I don't want any other little creatures in there! Spot likes to hide in both. They have been digging happily since they moved in up until the past few days. We may find that none of them are molting & only destressing which would be great, but I look forward to being able to see them all living happily in the new home.

[hprmom]

@crabbyjo, your 40B looks amazing!! Sorry I had a busy last half of April so I missed your message. I LOVE your new crabitat and I bet your hermies are loving their new home! I really like the tall spiky/grassy plant, and how you used the space on the ground.

I have a roll of jute ribbon that looks a lot like your hemp bridge but I haven't tried it yet because when I soaked it in salt water it had a weirdly chemical smell. When it dried I didn't smell it anymore but I haven't had a chance to ask if anyone else has experienced that. The ribbon came in fun colors, too!

Have your molters come up and moved to the new big tank yet?

[crabbyjo]

Hey hprmom!! Thank you about the crabitat. It's been fun putting it all together. 1 molter came up in the 10 g while we were on vacation last week so we did move him into the new 40b tank & he seems pretty darn happy. Still have 2 molters in the 10 right now. Thing I has been down for 8 weeks in the 10g so hoping to see him soon! We also have 2 molting in the 40b but we are happy to be able to watch 2 crabs late evening.

Something really weird is....George, the molter we moved into the 40b after our vacation is scared of us. Before his molt he was the sociable guy. He loved crawling all over my husband. He came out if we picked him up. I am guessing they don't have a very good memory.

[hprmom]

Something really weird is....George, the molter we moved into the 40b after our vacation is scared of us. Before his molt he was the sociable guy. He loved crawling all over my husband. He came out if we picked him up. I am guessing they don't have a very good memory.

I'm experiencing this, too. Before his molt, Hermie used to come to the glass and have feeler talks with me (I'd waggle my fingers). Herminy was more shy, but even he stopped running away at feeding time and just froze in place ("if I don't move, she can't see me!"). Both came out of their shells when handled (rarely). Now they frantically run and hide when so much as a shadow falls over the tank. One of the experienced crabbers said this is normal post-molt behavior, that they have to re-gain their surface confidence after being under. So that's probably all it is with George. It just seems to be taking a long time for their confidence to come back!

[soilentgringa]

The adoption sub forum is a little slow because the folks working it are having real life things to deal with presently.

I'm actually the adoption coordinator. We have an email address, two FB pages, and the forum here to check on a daily basis (this is in addition to monitoring all the threads, posts, and chat throughout the day). I just posted in the "Adoptees that need a new home" thread yesterday. The FB page has all the ads posted for current adoptions.
Sometimes the owners ask us to help, but for whatever reason, don't respond to us and we play tag trying to communicate.d
I am attempting to catch up on everything since Wode stepped down, and after tourist season is over there will be a rush of crabs needing new homes.
Have patience. I'm a single mom; child with special needs, and I'm already spending at least 2 hours a day on crab stuff. Remember that all us mods are volunteers and researching and assisting time is unpaid.
I'm happy to help everyone as much as I can, but mool is totally right- many of us are having IRL situations, whether health or family related.

[hprmom]

@soilentgringa, I set the fb page to be at the top of my notifications and I'm seeing adoption notices pop up regularly. Thanks for all you're doing.

[crabbyjo]

hprmom, I LOVE what you said....if I don't move they can't see me. So true!

It's good to know others find that to be true too about being afraid of us after a molt.

This hobby may just kill me. I'm staying up way too late to watch my crab family. On my way to bed at 1 a.m. I decided to peek in the iso tank & Thing 1 is up from his molt too!! I couldn't go to bed so I gave him a gentle dip in the fw pool & put him in the new tank & watched for too long.

So happy with 3 crabs to watch!!!

And I want to thank the adoption coordinator also! I appreciate all that you do. We all do.

[hprmom]

This hobby may just kill me. I'm staying up way too late to watch my crab family. On my way to bed at 1 a.m. I decided to peek in the iso tank & Thing 1 is up from his molt too!! I couldn't go to bed so I gave him a gentle dip in the fw pool & put him in the new tank & watched for too long.

So happy with 3 crabs to watch!!!

Yay, Thing 1!

LOL, I did the same thing when our first crabs came home, and again when the second set arrived, I lost so much sleep! Now that four out of five are up, they seem to have settled into a routine of coming out between 8-11PM, which is a much more reasonable viewing time for us! (They also have a second really active time in the wee hours of the morning.) But I need to change my feeding/tank maintenance time to earlier in the evening, so that they aren't running away and hiding when I open the tanks at 9 or 10PM.

[crabbyjo]

My guys are doing better at coming out earlier.

The last time I stayed up really late watching the crabs I slept in until 10:30 & when I got up my hubby said he thought maybe I was molting.

George is now coming out about 9:30 & Thing 1 is being shy right now & the other guy that is up is even more shy but at least now I can get to bed at a decent time. Gotta love our crabbies!

[hprmom]

The last time I stayed up really late watching the crabs I slept in until 10:30 & when I got up my hubby said he thought maybe I was molting.

But sometimes I do wish I could just bury for three or four weeks and emerge with a new lease on life!

[crabbyjo]

Ooh, I like that idea, hprmom!!