I did something kind of crazy...

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captmicha

Le tired.
Dec 6, 2006
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Kind of more crazy than usual, I mean.

At the international market, I was stockpiling my cart full of produce and getting odd looks at the quantity I was amassing (it's for my parrots), I happened over to the seafood section, always on the look out for something novel for my hermit crabs and I noticed that they had blue crabs on sale. I went over and took a closer look. They were really fresh looking, I looked closer and realized that some were still alive.

I don't really know what I was thinking, or if I was thinking at all, but I found the fiestiest one and picked up the tongs and went to pick him up. He grabbed onto another crab's leg and tore it off the other crab, but I think that one was already dead. Into the shopping bag he went, a single crab at about $.80. I wonder what the cashier thought...

I put him in a bucket of ice water and I emptied a 5 gallon that I had sitting around and set it up in my bathroom. I couldn't think of a cooler place in my house besides the basement but couldn't put it down there because I didn't want my parents to find out about this because they'd spazz out. My bathroom smells like a fishing dock... And it's weird to not have privacy... but whatever.

So it's on the tile floor and I have a fan running over it to keep it as cool as possible. I used Oceanic at half strength and I have a Whisper HOB filter running on the tank and I have no idea if it'll do anything to help cycle since it's been running in a fresh water tank until just then.

Anyways, I put the crab in and it seems angry and scared, but I don't blame it. He looked a little hungry so I put in a piece of squid and I'm guessing he ate it because it's not there anymore. I know I shouldn't have put food in there to keep the bioload down until a bacteria colony gets established in the filter but it was hard to deny him.

I found a guy in my town with a salt water tank and he's going to hook with up with filter squeezings so I can seed my filter. I probably won't have the nerve to ask but maybe he'll offer me some live sand to seed the playground sand I just put in. If not, Craigslist or a LFS will suffice.

If it survives the next few days, I'll put him in a 10 gallon. Then I'll see about what I can do about a larger tank. Maybe one day I'll have an aquarium stocked with livestock from the grocery store...

He has really pretty blue coloring but it's not visible in the pics. The tank now has sand in it, it's taking an infuriatingly long time to settle.

crab2.jpg
crab3.jpg

crab2.jpg crab3.jpg
 

jetajockey

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Apr 9, 2010
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Why the fans? What is the ambient room temp there? Just curious because we have tons of blue crabs here in the wild and I see them everywhere from way up in the river, in the brackish tide pools, in the gulf, and everywhere in between. In many of the places the temp is in the upper 70s if not in the low 80s this time of year.
 

captmicha

Le tired.
Dec 6, 2006
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The temp was 80 when I got home. I figured that cooler was better than warmer, especially since he's in such a small tank.
 

jetajockey

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Oh ok I was just curious, I don't know the care requirements of blue crabs, I've only brought them home in coolers on ice and their tank was a large stock pot =]

I went to MD for a family reunion when I was a kid and I remember they had HUGE blue crabs up there, compared to ours here.
 

Khemul

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Oct 14, 2010
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The easiest way to care for a Blue Crab seems to be... move it to a metal tank, increase temperature until the water starts to bubble, add seasonings. :evil_lol:


I've come across a few babies around here recently. They are rather cute...err, until you see what the claws can do. It's gonna be difficult to care for since they migrate a lot in the wild so natural environment is very wide (as well as temperature range). They will eat basically everything, including fish. Also be careful with your hands anywhere near it.
 

Big Mike

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Thats so cool!! Good luck, I hope he makes it.
 

silentcircuit

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Mar 3, 2011
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I'll be fine, they're basically indestructible.

As others have said, it'll get huge eventually.

Don't worry so much about cooling; again, it'll be fine.

Feeding it should be easy enough -- any kind of raw meat will be popular. Probably fish food or whatever else, too.

I don't know that keeping one of these guys is the best idea, especially long term, but to each their own.
 

sailedNJ

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Jan 9, 2011
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Maybe one day I'll have an aquarium stocked with livestock from the grocery store...
:lol: That cracked me up lol. I've got no advice whatsoever for keeping these guys alive. As for advice about turning them into cakes..well that's a different story.

In any case I enjoyed reading this post & good luck getting your new bathroom buddy to survive & hopefully thrive!
 

captmicha

Le tired.
Dec 6, 2006
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The easiest way to care for a Blue Crab seems to be... move it to a metal tank, increase temperature until the water starts to bubble, add seasonings. :evil_lol:
And the most delicious way too! Though I will think twice before eating crabs from now on since having one as a pet :O

Your a nut, with a big heart.
Lol. Thanks :)

I don't know that keeping one of these guys is the best idea, especially long term, but to each their own.
They're not supposed to live that long, only a few years and since it's a large adult, I doubt it has many more years left to go.

It's still alive today and got a water change and fed some homemade fish flakes (lots of fish, egg, veggies and fruit and grains). Seems to be calming down but also seemed to be testing it's ability to climb out of the tank. I need to get a cover! I called a LFS that has some actual brine aquariums (not aquarium salt) and they said they'd let me have some filter squeezings so I can seed my filter.

I hope I can move it to the basement eventually. I'm not sure how I'll accomplish that feat without setting off my parents though. They won't even let me have a small snail breeding tank down there... Moving out would be heaven... But that's another thread.
 
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