HCA: Hermit Crab Association

Hi everyone,

I'm a newbie who's been lurking for a couple of weeks. My son and I picked up 2 small hermit crabs while at the beach, Bob (my son's) and Guido (I name pets after famous music researchers, what can I say.) I got sucked in deep while researching how to care for them properly. (I'm trying to prove my husband wrong--hermies can be long-term pets when properly cared for.)

Once we got them home and into a tank, both promptly swapped shells and buried themselves. Prior to that, they had been rejecting most of the food we offered, but had been seriously chowing down on a sand dollar we had in the KK they came with.

They've been down for about a week and a half now, and fielding multiple-times-daily questions from my boys about when Bob and Guido will be back up; even my husband has taken to checking the tank a few times a day to check. My initial thought was that they were de-stressing, but I don't see any signs of them coming up at night: no tracks on smoothed over sand, no nibbles on the food I'm swapping out. I suspect they're molting, but at any rate, I suspect they'll be down for a couple more weeks at least. Does that sound about right, in terms of the timeline?

Hi and welcome!! Congrats on the hermies and doing your research

I've had some newbies come home and not go down at all, to some going down for a day, or a week, or several months - so it really just depends on the crab! They could be de-stressing and not molting as well - you'll have to find out when they come up!

NotaHoser wrote:Hi everyone,

I'm a newbie who's been lurking for a couple of weeks. My son and I picked up 2 small hermit crabs while at the beach, Bob (my son's) and Guido (I name pets after famous music researchers, what can I say.) I got sucked in deep while researching how to care for them properly. (I'm trying to prove my husband wrong--hermies can be long-term pets when properly cared for.)

Once we got them home and into a tank, both promptly swapped shells and buried themselves. Prior to that, they had been rejecting most of the food we offered, but had been seriously chowing down on a sand dollar we had in the KK they came with.

They've been down for about a week and a half now, and fielding multiple-times-daily questions from my boys about when Bob and Guido will be back up; even my husband has taken to checking the tank a few times a day to check. My initial thought was that they were de-stressing, but I don't see any signs of them coming up at night: no tracks on smoothed over sand, no nibbles on the food I'm swapping out. I suspect they're molting, but at any rate, I suspect they'll be down for a couple more weeks at least. Does that sound about right, in terms of the timeline?

Whatever you do, please resist the temptation to dig! Odds are they'll be fine, and if they're smalls, most of those seem to molt for about a month or so. But Jellybean is right, it totally depends on the crab, so if you don't see them at the end of 4-6 weeks, I wouldn't be too worried, either. Even small crabs are estimated to be 5-10 years old, so they've been around a while, and know what they're doing. Just keep giving them good conditions, water, food, etc, and they will most likely be just fine. Welcome to HCA!!!

Side note: Aren't the care sheets great???!!! I just love having such a wealth of information available. And being able to talk to other crabbers who've done this for a while is a definite plus!

Side note 2: When you have a crabitat with no crabs up because they're all molting, many members of HCA call that "pet sand". It's not just "sand which belongs to your pet", it's also "sometimes it seems like the sand is my pet...because I feed it, I water it..."

Pet sand...love it!

Bob came up about a day or so after I posted, and so I did a dance a little something like this:

I'm hoping Guido will be up soon, but I'll practice patience.

NotaHoser wrote:Pet sand...love it!

Bob came up about a day or so after I posted, and so I did a dance a little something like this:

I'm hoping Guido will be up soon, but I'll practice patience.

I like your banana dance! Patience is very important when owning crabs. Best of luck!