Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Our Crabitat...

Princess and I spent a great deal of time today,
discussing and worrying about one of our little crabs.It's the one closest to us in the above picture.
I think it's dead, she thinks it's molting.
My friend, Amy Sue
gave us a bit of helpful advice to figure it out.
We are still not sure, but since the crab did not fall out
of the shell when moved, we're going with molting,
and giving it more time. We did move them into a bigger crabitat,
which makes it so much easier for me to change their food and water
every day. Princess usually does food, I do water. She tried..it spills too easy.
Here are a few pictures of the other two checking out their space..they were very cute
running around checking everything out and then greeting each other with a lot of antennae
action and then they curled up next to each other under the driftwood and went back to sleep.
We were actually under a tornado warning here in our little corner of the Garden State
last night, but although the storms were violent, we survived with no sign of damage or flooding.
Pumpkin and Alley (from left to right) waiting for the crabs to be left unattended?

7 comments:

Jennifer said...

I trust you've already done the relevant research, but here's a link anyway: how to care for molting hermit crabs.

She looks like a fairly large crab to me, so the process could take many weeks.

In my experience, when a hermit crab has died, it's been sudden and the crab has removed itself from the shell overnight.

They're such interesting little beasties. Good luck!

Butterfly 8)(8 Bungalow said...

I hope P's crab is doing okay today.

I am glad you got through the storm safely.

Unknown said...

Trenton loved the pictures! He said...Mommy buy me this please. I told him maby when he gets a bit bigger.

Frankie said...

Our hermit crabs all died. We coudln't figure it out, because we did everything "right". I hope your hermit crab does all right.

A new pet store opened ten miles from us and they had hermit crabs. I talked with the owner and he told me ours probably died because they were tiny -- his were huge. I've been thinking of getting Thomas more for Christmas because we have everything we need. If I do, I'll need to brush up on hermit crabs. We had ours a couple years ago.

sarah said...

I hope your crab turns out to be alright. The other day, the girls of our hs group were looking out the window of the classroom and discussing a duck lying in a puddle. Most said it was dead, but Rose insisted it was just moulting. I went over later and saw that this duck was *definitely* dead! Rose just couldnt bear to think of it. I didnt know whether to laugh or cry.

Wendy said...

Fruit!!! Inquiring minds want to know:
Are your cherries sweet or pie? Are the black ones Black Tartarians?
Are your grapes wine or table and how has that worked for you in your climate?
Do you make pie or jam with the gooseberries or can you just eat them?
Why no blueberries?

Your figs look lovely!

Pineapple!!! Ahh, fruit envy...

Crabs:
One of our crabs is molting now. She is dug into the sand and we won't see any signs of life for three weeks.

Having gone through both death and molting with crabs, here's the voice of sad experience: try to resist the temptation to check the crab! If they die, you will smell it within 12 hours. Checking too much can cause an "unsuccessful molt" (which you will smell in 12 hours...

Your new crabitat looks great!!!

Cher Mere said...

Those crabs sure are cute. :) I am glad you didn't experience any damage from the weather.

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My homeschool buddies and I are all posting pics of our "home schools" as part of our idea sharing.

Plato said...

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