Crabby Care

[lighteningbee]

Hello everyone! My 4 year old son and I are new Crabby owners. I am sure no one is suprised that the pet store gave us wrong information on our Crabby care... First we were told to keep a light on them all of the time... that they get scared in the dark... So they set us up as a light as our heat source. I know that is incorrect. I turned the light off but I now need to know the best way to keep them warm. I live 60 miles from the nearest pet store so shopping for the "perfect" heat source has to wait until this weekend, but what is the best thing to do in the mean time. I am trying a regular heating pad under our 10 gallon aquariam, but it was getting too hot. I put a towel between the heating pad and aquariam. I also am using gravel... but only an inch... which I think it needs to be thicker, and I am not so sure gravel is best... OK so I am in huge trouble with this. I do not want these little guys to suffer. I have been getting up in the middle of the night to check there temp! Any help on anything is greatly appreciated!
Thanks
Colleen, Cody, Crusty the Crab, and Crabby the Crab

[moire_eel]

Hi, and welcome to the forum! Yep, pet stores are notorious about not knowing the first thing about hermit crab care. I will try to answer your questions, and probably ask a few as well.

First of all, gravel's not a good substrate. Crabs cannot dig in it, and they need to in order to feel secure and to have safe molts. I would reccomend playsand (cheap, and sold at hardware stores) marine sand (sold in the fish section of the pet store) or coconut fiber bedding (sold at pet stores, usually in the reptile section, under brands names such as Eco Earth and Forest Bedding). The substrate should be kept moist -- "sand castle-making consistency" -- and twice as deep as your largest crab to allow for burrowing.

For a heat source using a UTH, or under-tank heater, is probably the most popular. You'll need to keep the substrate over the heater a bit shallower -- no more than an inch or two -- so that the heat can penetrate it. You'll als o need to make sure there is airflow around the UTH, so if you put it on the bottom of your tank, you'll need to elevate the tank a few inches.

I use a 40-watt ceramic heating element mounted in a regular clamp-lamp fixture, like this:



Ceramic heating elements give off heat, but no light. I had to order one online to find a low enough wattage, since pet stores tend to only sell 100 and 150 watt ones, which would be too hot. You can also use a moon-glow bulb, which gives of a dim purplish light that won't bother your crabs at night. You can buy moonglow bulbs at a pet store.

Another very important thing that your pet store may not have told you about is maintaining proper humidity in your tank, which is between the low 70s to low 80s relative humidity. You should get a gauge to measure this, because it's extremely important. If humidity is too low, crabs cannot breathe well. If it is too high, you can get mold growth in your tank! Usually, though the problem is with it being too low. You didn't mention whether you had a top for your tank. To keep humidity in, you should cover most of the top of your tank, but leave some space (at least 20 percent) open for airflow. If you don't have top, you can use saran wrap or press-n-seal until you can get a glass or plexiglass one.

As for what you can do before you can purchase a new heat source -- I'd use the lamp as before during the day, and perhaps the heating pad at night if you can't raise the temp in your house up. BTW, the ideal temperature range for hermit crabs is 75 to 80 degrees, and temps below 70 can be harmful for them.

Hope this helps, and please feel free to drop by and ask more questions!

[lighteningbee]

Thanks so much for the info.

We are using the lid that came with the aquariam. (The kind used with fish). I covered the wholes with tape to help hold in moisture. I was not told that I need to measure the moisture, but I did learn about that on the internet... Again I can't buy one until this weekend. All we have is wal-mart and they do not carry ANYTHING for these poor little guys! I am so worried about them lol What about food... how much do they eat... I can't tell if they are eating anything. I have crab food (I'm not at home so I can't check the brand) but they are little tiny balls of food. I also have tried to give them nuts (I didn't know what kind so I gave them walnuts) and last night I gave them peanut butter. I think it looks like they may have eaten some of the peanut butter. I don't want them to starve! This is all a little more complicated then I expected... I mean I am VERY familiar with animal care. I have grew up with horses, dogs, cats, birds, goats, cows, sheep... and I honestly thought crabs would be a piece of cake. Ok again thanks for the info and any type of help you think I may need please give it!
Colleen

[lighteningbee]

Oops I forgot... for keeping moisture the "pet" store had me buy some sort of moss to soak in water and put in the tank... They seem to like it... Crusty (by the way my 4 year old named them) spends alot of his/her time there, but is the moss a good thing for these guys. Should I use something else for moisture?

[tb1234]

http://www.epicureanhermit.com has great suggestions for food. But some things they will love to have is popcorn (plain), scrambled eggs cooked in olive oil, and they love some of the shells left in there, coconut, seaweed, fruits and veggies. Usually, you can give them good variety with just the stuff outta your fridge, but they do require some extras in their diet. But that website is a good starting point.