hermit crabs?

**tikeyas_mom** · 03-09-2005, 09:56 PM

my friend has a couple hermit crabs, they keep dieing...

.. poor things.. she had one large one, he lasted about a week before dieing...

they arnt very hardy. and she is doing everything right...

HElp...

**flamepony12** · 03-09-2005, 11:10 PM

okay, well, first of all, here is what I have learned from having hermies....

-DO NOT keep their habitat too humid!! Fungus will grow and kill them. In fact, I keep mine in an open glass tank. Mine survive for a long time, and All I need to do is stick them in a bowl of DECLORINATED water for about 2 minutes at a time, once a week.

- As I mentioned before, make sure the water they drink and bathe in is declorinated! That means no tap water. Bottled water is fine, and you can also buy declorinator at your local pet store. Chlorine is poisonous to the little guys!

- Are they getting sand in their shells? If so, this may cause them to come out of their shell and become a "nudie". If they are exposed too long, they will die. If this occurs, please tell her to first boil the new shell, (without the crab in it, of course!) then, place the crab in a small glass with the shell. if it doesn't go in by itself, gently rap it on the head and try to ease it back in. We saved one of our hermit crabs' lives with this procedure!

Hope this helped- feel free to ask if you have anymore questions!

**BitsyNaceyDog** · 03-10-2005, 07:27 AM

I would have told you just the opposite, to my knowledge they need quite a bit of humidity. My good friend got 10 hermit crabs 3 years ago and had only lost 1 of them... that's a pretty good record if you ask me. She keeps them in a big tank with a fair amount of humidity. I know she has a humidity gage, but I don't know what she maintains it at. They are from a tropical setting, so it would make sense that they need humidity.

I would suggest googling it and see what several different sites say.

**Logan** · 03-10-2005, 09:20 AM

I just love them but we had horrible luck with them too.

I finally gave up on hamsters and hermit crabs as we were so depressed everytime one died.

**BitsyNaceyDog** · 03-10-2005, 10:49 AM

While eating lunch I did a little hermit crab research and I talked to my friend.

Everything I found said to keep the humidity at 70%. It also said to keep them in a glass fish tank with a soild cover, not mesh as it won't hold the humidity. It said that they will become weak if there is too little humidity. They can easily become dehydrated. I also asked my friend what she keeps her humidity at and she said 70%.

**wolfsoul** · 03-10-2005, 03:20 PM

Originally posted by flamepony12
- As I mentioned before, make sure the water they drink and bathe in is declorinated! That means no tap water.

The tap water in Kelowna doesn't actually have any chlorine in it -- so tapwater for her crabs should be fine.

**flamepony12** · 03-10-2005, 06:31 PM

Originally posted by wolfsoul
The tap water in Kelowna doesn't actually have any chlorine in it -- so tapwater for her crabs should be fine.

oh, ok

**tikeyas_mom** · 03-11-2005, 06:06 PM

it seems like she is doing everything right... she has them housed with an anole now.. a type of herp... it doesnt bother the hermits, but the crickets might....

**bckrazy** · 03-11-2005, 07:18 PM

I also had the worst luck with hermit crabs! My sister got 2 for me for my 13th birthday... from a wierd gift shop in the mall

probably not the best place to get a pet :embarassed:

the large crab would constantly pinch and when you picked him up he'd reach back to pinch.. it was scary.. I did all that the handbook said, they had a nice aquarium and everything, but they died within a few weeks. I think the larger one killed the smaller one...

they were named Sid and Nancy