1, temperature. Not less than 2 1 Fahrenheit and not more than 26 Fahrenheit. Continued low temperature will kill hermit crabs. Overheating can lead to irreversible damage and slow and painful death. The symptoms of overheating are brown liquid secretion and musty smell.
2. humidity. 70% relative humidity. The absolute humidity is about 50%, but most hygrometers measure relative humidity. Please remember to make your feeding box feel damp, rainy and "tropical".
3. Cushion. The depth of the filler should be enough for hermit crabs to enter, but not so deep that your bottom heater can't work. If it is difficult for you to keep the incubator warm, try to remove the gasket of the bottom heater. If you want to cool the feeding box, turn off the heater.
Food, water, shells and other equipment to keep hermit crabs busy and lively.
Friend! I believe you have heard that you can't just keep hermit crabs as pets! The name "hermit" (foreigners call hermit crab hermit crab, which means "hermit crab"-translator) is really inappropriate. They are very sociable and like to stay with their own kind. In the wild, they form hundreds of groups and look for food and shells on the beach. The reason why they move in groups is simple: where there are many hermit crabs, there are also many shells! When researchers put a clean shell on the beach, they will queue up to change the shell: one crab is replaced with a new shell, the other one gets into the old shell of the last one, the other one gets into the old shell of this one, and so on. Usually, my hermit crabs sleep together in groups of 20. So please don't let your hermit crab friend live a lonely life, find him a companion, of course, the more the better.
house
The first thing your new friend needs is a feeding box. He will stay in the breeding box most of the time, so please choose a clean and spacious home. You can buy a 10 gallon aquarium as the main equipment. If you can't afford an aquarium, a plastic box will do. Decide in advance how many hermit crabs you want to raise and what kind of home you want them to be. This will help you choose the right size feeding box. Make sure your breeding box can hold your pets, their food and water dishes, extra shells and climbing toys. Although plastic boxes are suitable for temporary feeding boxes or isolation boxes, they are not recommended as long-term homes.
The second important aspect is padding. Don't forget that your crab has to sit on it every day! There are many bedding materials to choose from, but not all of them are suitable for hermit crabs. The best bedding is gravel and sand from the aquarium.
There are many kinds of gravel, choose the one that feels smooth. Rough gravel makes it difficult for hermit crabs to walk and scratch their bodies. In addition, only when you see the words "it is safe to use in the aquarium" can you use dyed sand.
Water: drink water and take a bath.
The most important water rule for hermit crabs is: don't give water that hermit crabs can't use in tropical fish aquariums.
The choice of basin depends on the amount and depth of water. Bigger crabs need bigger pots. Sometimes hermit crabs sit in pots. It is important to check the basin every day to make sure there is clean and enough water in it. Pottery pots, cement pots, big shells and plastic bottle caps are all good choices, but don't choose metal plates. Hermit crabs are sensitive to metals.
Attention!
Make sure your basin is not too deep, the little hermit crab will drown in it. If the big and small hermit crabs are raised together, you can put a sponge in the big pot, so that the little hermit crab can have an island if it accidentally goes in.
Wash dishes!
When you change the water, you may notice some mud at the bottom of the basin. Don't leave them on the plate.
have a bath
Yes! Your hermit crab needs a bath every week. In the natural environment, hermit crabs live in a humid environment where it often rains. We can't provide rain, so taking a bath is a good choice. Bathing is very necessary-it can keep their gills moist. There should be no chlorine in the water, and the temperature should be room temperature, not significantly higher or lower than room temperature. Hang the hermit crab upside down in the bathtub. When it comes out, the water will flow into the shell and wash away the dirty things. Let them crawl or run freely for a few minutes after bathing, then take them out of the bathtub, drip dry water and let them walk around to dry. Some people have a special playground for them to dry their bodies. Their "drying box" can be a shoe box covered with paper towels.
Then put the dried hermit crab back into the breeding box and look around. They will be extremely active and crawl around!
You can also clean your feeding box when you take a shower. Take out the dirty things, throw out the sand in the shells and put the food on the plate. At the same time, you can also make some changes to the layout of the breeding box to keep your hermit crabs fresh.
toy
Hermit crabs love to play! They like to crawl around and can hide in anything you give them. Here are some good toys:
Dry Gioia (or Jolla) wood (in fact, they eat it, too)
Wood of various shapes.
coral
Artificial hermit crab cabin
Plastic plants
……
Be careful not to put wood (pine and cypress) and green trees together. Hermit crabs don't like it.
sponge
Putting a natural sponge the size of a baseball in a plate filled with water and then putting the plate next to or on the heater will be very helpful for humidification.
The key to using a sponge is to have two pieces. This can avoid mildew and bacterial growth. Wash with hot water or sterilize in the microwave oven (2 minutes). Be sure to clean it often!
The most important thing to note is! ! The most important thing to note is! ! The most important thing to note is! !
People often ask me: "What are the first precautions for raising terrestrial hermit crabs?" The answer is to keep the environment moist! Terrestrial hermit crabs evolved to have hard gills, but they are still gills, not lungs, and can't breathe like us. The air that the terrestrial hermit crab breathes must be moist, otherwise its gills will dry out. And crabs will endure a long and unpleasant suffocation death, similar to the death of dehydrated people.
Of course, don't be too wet, too wet will breed bacteria and endanger the health of crabs. 50%-60% relative humidity is the most suitable.
Why is my hermit crab like this?
The behavior of terrestrial hermit crabs is very interesting. First of all, every hermit crab has its own unique personality. For example, in my breeding box, there are dull and thankless beasts. They hardly come out of the shell except pinching me. But in the same feeding box, Friendly and Oprah came out and greeted me very eagerly.
Normal communication
Hermit crabs have several standard behavior patterns: crawling on each other, fighting with tentacles or wrestling. Tentacle fighting and wrestling are normal behaviors, and they are just testing each other. As for climbing on others, it's because hermit crabs don't seem to take detours. They only climb or drill through obstacles.
The above actions are harmless unless you see one tearing at the door of another, which is usually the beginning of a shell war.
Shell wars often occur between pet hermit crabs, and there will be a "chirp" sound in the battle (can you hear this? -translator). The attacker will climb on the defender's back, grab the defender with his walking legs, and then pull hard, while the pliers will be placed in the defender's shell. If the defender is successfully pulled out, the successful attacker will get into the shell of the loser, and the loser will usually wait and get into the shell of the winner. Usually, in this case, neither side will get hurt.
Hermit crab violence
Grumpy, big mouth, Attila is not friendly to humans, but good to other compatriots in the breeding box. But some hermit crabs are not like this. Terrestrial hermit crabs will kill their companions by many means: tearing up their opponents, dragging them out of their shells, or attacking them when they shed their shells, literally meaning "eating them alive"! Terrestrial hermit crabs are scavengers, so they don't care about eating the same kind. It is conceivable that this habit will make the owner of hermit crab deeply uneasy. The usual story is that you find a string of crab legs in the incubator or see the victim walking around naked or dead. 75% crabs will die soon after being pulled out of their shells. If you find him alive, isolate him immediately. Wash away the silt in its soft abdomen, and then let it return to the shell according to the practice of the problem area. If it is healthy enough, it will recover. Try not to disturb it.
food
Feed it what?
In the wild, terrestrial hermit crabs eat all kinds of food: fallen fruits, rotten wood, fallen leaves, plants and weeds, and organic matter washed ashore by the tide. They are never picky eaters, and some people even see them eating feces! There are two ways for terrestrial hermit crabs to find food: smelling the food or seeing their companions eating it.
We don't know what hermit crabs eat in the wild, but hermit crabs can survive for a long time by occasionally eating a single variety of "crab food" with other snacks. Crab food is FMR brand, a product of foreigners.
Usually hermit crab recipes:
2 cuttlefish bones.
Two cups of dry rice.
1/2 cups tasteless sand
1 cup tasteless oatmeal
1tsp iodine-free sea salt (he said iodine is toxic to hermit crabs)
1/4 cups of FMR crab food
Mixing and grinding into powder. Other ingredients can also be added: corn flour, soda crackers, bread crumbs, etc. Cuttlefish bones are rich in calcium, which is good for the exoskeleton of hermit crabs that have just molted.
Hermit crabs like all kinds of food. In fact, the study found that hermit crabs like to change their tastes. You should provide a variety of choices for your hermit crab. There are many foods that your hermit crab may like: fruits (except acidic fruits such as oranges and tomatoes), especially tropical fruits such as mango, coconut and papaya in the habitat of hermit crab. Vegetables (except fresh starchy vegetables, such as potatoes), nuts, jam, raisins, assorted salads, peanut butter, honey, cooked eggs and meat, fresh fish and shellfish, grains, biscuits, washed fallen leaves and bark, washed grass and popcorn. Some owners find that they like junk food, but no matter how much they like it, they should control it in a small amount. Never feed dairy products to hermit crabs, because the digestive system of hermit crabs can't digest dairy products and will eventually die.
Of course, the best feed is natural feed. Here are some feeds that can be found in pet shops:
Frozen fruit or vegetarian iguana food
dried shrimp
seaweed
Brine shrimp
bait
Vegetarian fish food