Stupid Crabs

VDub90

AC Members
Oct 23, 2004
179
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0
Nanaimo, BC
For the last 3 months I have had about half a dozen crabs, couple blue legs, a couple scarlet, a few that look like blue legs but the red and blue bands are in the wrong spot, and 2 bigger green guys. They have all lived with 3 astrea and 3 very small nassarius snails. At Christmas time I went away for a week to come back and find all 3 astrea's upside down, one was still in the shell, but didn't make it. I figured the crabs might have had something to do with it , but thought that the snails just fell over, since the crabs haven't bothered them in the 2 months they have been together. The Nassarius are still doing fine. So on my way home from Christmas break I bought a turbo snail, and 3 more Nassarius, well it only took one night, as the next morning all 4 were on their backs. The turbo snail however was still in it's shell for a few more days but never moved. The day before yesterday I picked up 3 more Nassarius snails, which for 2 days they were doing great, well when I got home today they were all tipped over and 2 were out of there shells. And one of the smaller crabs was definelty picking at it :mad: .There are a ton of empty shells on the tank bottom now as there has always been, what has turned my crabs mad? Are the fake looking blue legs bad? Should I get them out of there?
 
If a hermit crab wants a shell, it WILL get that shell. Its just like someone going shopping for a house, sure there may be lots of houses for sale, but the buyer is usually looking for a specific house type. Same is true with hermit crabs.
 
I guess the Astrea shells were the wrong shape for them and the Nassarius were way to small. But the new snails I have bought(6 of them so far)seem to be a perfect fit.
 
Find a dozen empty hermit crab shells online,and toss them in. Most marine sites have them. Give the crabs some more real estate options, other than the snail shells!

HTH!
 
Right now I have 3 turbos, 10 margaritas, 6 nassarius, 10 dwarf red legs and 3 scarlets. My tank is 37g BTW... MY LFS sells bags of empty shells, so I bought a bag of small/medium shells, and a bag of larger shells. So far, no snail deaths, and 3 of my dwarf hermits have happily found new homes in the empty shells....
 
I'm wondering if it might be something besides the shell thing? They crabs and snails lived fine together for over 2 months, and there has always been a lot of shells in the tank.
 
Occasionally I have had snails simply stop moving and die. Lost a whole batch of astreas at one point, after they had lived in the tank for a few years. I still have no idea what causes it, but I wonder if it's a bloom of toxic algae or dinoflagellates.
 
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