Blue legged hermit crabs gone?

ndz98 · Nov 10, 2015

I bought four blue legged hermit crabs the other day to maybe help clean things up and this morning I noticed two empty shells. I saw one moving a minute ago. The fourth is MIA still. Is it possible they left there shell and went into another shell? I know the sand has some smaller shells in it that they could fit in and I also have bigger shells but I'd doubt they would have moved into them yet.

RMS18 · Nov 10, 2015

Wish that was happening in my tank.

ndz98 · Nov 10, 2015

Bmwm235i said:
Wish that was happening in my tank.

What's happening with yours instead lol

Ed Urias · Nov 10, 2015

I had this problem about a month ago when I introduced a couple blue legged hermit crabs to my tank. I thought I lost a crab the next morning because I noticed an empty shell and what looked like a dead crab, but I later on found the crab hiding in my live rock. These crabs can be very tricky. They molt and sometimes ditch their shells to only pick them back up on a later note. Also the dead exoskeleton that remains after molting looks a lot like a dead crab.

ndz98 · Nov 10, 2015

Ed Urias said:
I had this problem about a month ago when I introduced a couple blue legged hermit crabs to my tank. I thought I lost a crab the next morning because I noticed an empty shell and what looked like a dead crab, but I later on found the crab hiding in my live rock. These crabs can be very tricky. They molt and sometimes ditch their shells to only pick them back up on a later note. Also the dead exoskeleton that remains after molting looks a lot like a dead crab.

Well that's pretty wild sounding. Hopefully they pop back into there shells because I like watching them crawl around on the sand. Thank you!

ndz98 · Nov 11, 2015

A little update on the crabs...I was just looking in my tank and I noticed they went into slightly bigger shells! They have only been in there for a little over 48 hours and already felt the need to change things up

Ed Urias · Nov 11, 2015

ndz98 said:
A little update on the crabs...I was just looking in my tank and I noticed they went into slightly bigger shells! They have only been in there for a little over 48 hours and already felt the need to change things up

They've probably never have had that option in their past homes haha