Hello !

[Kris10729]

Good evening everyone,

I have been coming to this forum for almost a year for advice or when I've had questions, even when they seemed silly or outrageous, and have always found what I was looking for. Not only has taking what I've learned here made me a better crab mom but it has also greatly improved (and continues to improve) the standard of living for my crabs.

That being said, my name is Kristen. I bought my first crab at the Jersey Shore (Zip) and quickly realized how cool he was. He would perk up and starting moving about his tank every time I came into the room and turned a light on. I bought him a bigger home and two new friends, Peanut and Shelly, shortly thereafter.

They lived happily in their tank, and walking about my room on play nights, until recently when I upgraded them to a new super home, with pools and a second level and more room and, of course, two more friends-Pea and Sandy. The latter just came home with me yesterday after a trip to the petstore to get some plants. Pea is small and quite pale but very active. Sandy was in a shell that was way to small, her big claw covering the shell opening pretty much.

They each have their own personalities. Zip is the most social. He loves to be out and crawling all over me. Shelly is pretty social, too, and a little bit bigger while Peanut is shy and is on the smaller side. My two new ones are very active and I'm still learning their personalities but it seems like Sandy is more social while Pea doesn't like to be bothered too much.

Zip loves to change shells. Both of my bigger crabs changed shells after I brought them home (which makes me happy because Sandy's shell was too small) and Zip likes going back and forth between their old shells, often within the same hour, and picking new shells once every week or two.

Their tank is a 30 gallon bin. There are two pools, one FW and one SW, made out of small paint trays with bubblers. There is a second level-with a coconut hut, some shells and a treat dish-which I made out of kitchen items. There are all sorts of climbing apparatus to get between levels. They have a regular water dish, food dish, sand and earth substrate and shells on the bottom. I found an awesome deal on shells at a local big box craft store. They carry bags of 20-25 multi-sized shells for just a few dollars. The whole setup cost me less than $50, way cheaper than commercial crab habitats, so with a little resourcefulness and education, it's more than reasonable to offer crabs the life they need and deserve. No crab should be kept in those crappy carriers they usually come in! (End rant)

So that's our story. Thank you for all of the great posts already on here. This site has a lot of great information.

Kristen

[mool]

Thanks for sharing your successes and enthusiasm with us! And Welcome!

[Crabinski]

Welcome aboard as an "official" HCAer! And, of course, pictures please!

[hprmom]

Great story, Kristen, and encouraging to others (me included). Thanks for sharing!

[Kris10729]

Thank you so much, everyone, for welcoming me!

As requested, here is a picture of my crabitat. The HC you can see at the top in the white bin is Zip changing back and forth in the discarded shells of my two bigger crabs. He finally settled on one after going back and forth about 30 times, only to change again when he went downstairs. Lol
http://m.imgur.com/lMOIe8v