Teddy Bear Crab

firefighterj80 · Feb 15, 2024

Been trying to catch this guy for a few weeks now. Woke up this morning to find him actually in the trap. For the last couple months I thought I had a gorilla crab and looks to me like it's actually a teddy bear crab. Too bad these things aren't reef safe, super cool looking crab. He's been relocated to a local reefer with a "pest" tank.

ISpeakForTheSeas · Feb 15, 2024

firefighterj80 said:
For the last couple months I thought I had a gorilla crab and looks to me like it's actually a teddy bear crab.

Great pics and a cool crab - glad to hear it's getting a good home!

Slight correction here - this crab appears to be a Common Hairy Crab, Pilumnus vespertilio, rather than a Teddy Bear Crab, Polydectus cupulifer; either way, definitely not reef safe, and still very fuzzy.

firefighterj80 · Feb 15, 2024

ISpeakForTheSeas said:
Great pics and a cool crab - glad to hear it's getting a good home!

Slight correction here - this crab appears to be a Common Hairy Crab, Pilumnus vespertilio, rather than a Teddy Bear Crab, Polydectus cupulifer; either way, definitely not reef safe, and still very fuzzy.

No idea, I do know the common hairy crab eats mostly seaweed. This guy demolished some torch colonies and I'm pretty sure a couple small fish. Teddy Bear or hairy, he had to go regardless

ISpeakForTheSeas · Feb 15, 2024

firefighterj80 said:
No idea, I do know the common hairy crab eats mostly seaweed. This guy demolished some torch colonies and I'm pretty sure a couple small fish.

Yeah, they seem to be pretty opportunistically predatory:

ISpeakForTheSeas said:
Looks like it might be the Common Hairy Crab, Pilumnus vespertilio - not reef-safe, but would be a cool sump monster:

"In general, P. vespertilio consumes a wide range of foods, including crustose coralline algae and various other kinds of red/green/brown algae [2][22]. It is also known to prey on several intertidal animals, including brittle stars, marine gastropods (sea snails), bivalves (clams), bristle worms, and sea slugs [2][22]. In addition, they may also consume toxic zoanthids, which may make some members of this species mildly poisonous[4]."

Source:

https://wiki.nus.edu.sg/display/TAX/Pilumnus+vespertilio+-+Hairy+crab

InvertObsession · Jun 7, 2024

Does anyone have experience keeping multiple common hairy crabs in the same tank? Mine has gone after small fish and hermit crabs but I haven’t heard of anyone keeping a few in the same tank.

ISpeakForTheSeas · Jun 9, 2024

InvertObsession said:
Does anyone have experience keeping multiple common hairy crabs in the same tank? Mine has gone after small fish and hermit crabs but I haven’t heard of anyone keeping a few in the same tank.

Most people don't purposefully keep crabs like this (as you can't really keep them with anything else), so I don't know how they'd do in a group. I would guess (quite possibly inaccurately) that you may see aggression between members of the same sex, but you might not.

If you try keeping multiples, let us know how it goes!