Got given 15 hermit crabs new to taking care of them advice would be great!!

[reighleyscrew]

We have 15 hermit crabs all different sizes and colors. Any advice you have to give would be amazing. These are a few pictures of our babies.











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[JoeHermits]

Welcome to the forum! My advice would be to read through our care sheets and come back if you have any specific questions.

viewtopic.php?t=119273


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[reighleyscrew]

Thank you so much. I have read most of them We have three tanks set up.

One is a 30 gallon it has the 4 small crabs in it.
1. Hermione (the smallest)
2. Ginny
3. Neville
4. Draco

Yes we are potter heads

The next tank is 40 gallons it has 4 medium crabs in it.

1. Fleur
2. Trelawney
3. Ron
4. Molly


Then we have a 69 gallon tank that has 7 small crabs in it

1. Harry
2. Katie Bell
3. Cedric
4. Tonks
5. Lupin
6. Quibby (named after the Lovegood magazine)
7. Snape

These are all rescues except Hermione and Ginny. We had them before getting the rescues. We had a pet shop in our area get busted for being a puppy mill. The vet I work with knew that we had hermit crabs and brought us half of what the pet shop had. They are all pretty beat up missing limbs and claws. Shells showing damage and most were in the stupid painted shells that I hate. We have gotten a lot of them to switch shells into natural shells and have removed the painted shells as they become empty.

I have no issues with temps but keeping the humidity up is a full time job. I have ordered two more reptile humidifiers to put into the two other tanks. I have one and that tank is perfect but it is almost the one tank that doesn’t have a metal mesh top. My husband keeps our house at 65 degrees and I believe this why I’m having such a hard time keeping the tanks humid even though the temp is good. I can’t wait until the other humidifiers come in tomorrow.


I do have some questions!!


What food do you recommend using? I can’t really tell they are eating what we have unless it’s fresh food of course!

What are some ideas on how to make a soaking pool big enough for my largest crab which is about the size of a golf including shell?

Thank you for any help.


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[Jlmills525]

Soaking pools can be made from zip lock sandwich containers.. if you double them, you can leave the bottom one in whenever you need to refresh or change them... use like plastic craft mesh to create 'ramps' i have red marbles in my salt water and blue ones in my fresh so i can keep them straight. If you want to get really fancy, some people put bubblers in their soaking pools so they don't have to refresh them as often, it also helps with humidity.

You can search youtube for hermit crab soaking pools for more visuals.

[reighleyscrew]

Soaking pools can be made from zip lock sandwich containers.. if you double them, you can leave the bottom one in whenever you need to refresh or change them... use like plastic craft mesh to create 'ramps' i have red marbles in my salt water and blue ones in my fresh so i can keep them straight. If you want to get really fancy, some people put bubblers in their soaking pools so they don't have to refresh them as often, it also helps with humidity.

You can search youtube for hermit crab soaking pools for more visuals.

Thank you so much. I’ll look into YouTube for some ideas.


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[JTKermie]

15 of them! That's got to be a lot of clanking, scratching and scurrying at night! LOL Sounds like amazing setups you have. In terms of pools, I use 1quart sized food containers. Doubled up so the first one can stay recessed in the substrate. I use walmart plastic canvas cut to fit and zip tied to the edge of the containers so they can get in/out easily. Here's a pic of one of my 29 gal setups with 3 little crabbys.. That I never see.

[reighleyscrew]

That is a great picture for visual. Thank you so much I will start a Walmart order today lol. If you don't mind my asking? Why don't you ever see your crabbys? Thank you for the picture again.

[JTKermie]

That is a great picture for visual. Thank you so much I will start a Walmart order today lol. If you don't mind my asking? Why don't you ever see your crabbys? Thank you for the picture again.

I'm hoping it's because they dug down to molt, which can take a month to a year.

I am new to keeping them the right way. The last time I kept them (poorly) was as a child many years ago. Like 1980-ish.

I didn't quite start off right this time either having purchased all my hermit crabs. No telling how they were cared for prior to me getting them. If I could do a do-over, I'd do my best to adopt captive bread hermit crabs. They're going to be happier, healthier and used to be in captivity.

[reighleyscrew]

We have had 3 molt and seem to be doing great. I wasn't in the know of everything not to do with our crabs in the beginning as well. My daughter wanted them so we got 3 to begin with. I did know they don't like being alone, but I didn't know that you shouldn't dig them up if the have dug underground and that humidity was so important. The person we got her first 3 from didn't have anything other than an inch of sand and water dish about .5 deep. So I didn't realize they need the moisture to breath well. We lost one, seemly over night. She was a tiny little thing and I am not sure how she died or why but I know the humidity was low in the tank the day she died and it broke my baby girls heart. The others seem to be doing great and now that we have all the others they all seem to be healthy. I'm just concentrating on learning as much as I can to keep from losing anymore of them. I have always had dogs and cats, but crabs are new for me so I am still learning.

[reighleyscrew]

Here are my set ups. I have removed the under tank heaters because the person I got them from told me to put them under the sand. But after removing those very carefully some more of my crabs came back to the surface which makes me happy. Im going to buy some new ones to put on the glass like they are suppose to be. I also have a hard time with humidity staying good in my house so I have foggers in my tanks. They are doing great. I’m kinda worried about having the white lights on during the day and the blue light at night. So I guess I’m asking is it okay to have the basking lights on during the day?
Here are few more pictures of our crabs and the pictures of our tanks.







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[curlysister]

Your set ups look fabulous!
Heat lights can tend to lower the humidity, so keep an eye on that if you are using lamps for heat.

[reighleyscrew]

Your set ups look fabulous!
Heat lights can tend to lower the humidity, so keep an eye on that if you are using lamps for heat.

Thank you so much. We are trying hard learning as we go. I wish I didn’t have to use the heat lamps but my husband is a polar bear I am pretty sure lol. So my house is 60-65 year around. If you have any suggestions on better heat sources I would greatly appreciate them.


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[Jlmills525]

UTH but attached to the back or side instead of bottom.. just even with top of substrate or otherwise above it.

Ultratherm i think is the preferred brand.. I got mine from Reptile Basics but there's another online store that has them too, i just can't remember the name because they were out of stock when i wanted to order mine

[reighleyscrew]

UTH but attached to the back or side instead of bottom.. just even with top of substrate or otherwise above it.

Ultratherm i think is the preferred brand.. I got mine from Reptile Basics but there's another online store that has them too, i just can't remember the name because they were out of stock when i wanted to order mine

Thank you so much. I will look into those and update as soon as I get them fixed up.


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