Fiddler Crabs, anyone?

[GermanMusician]

Hi,

I just bought 6 fiddler crabs a couple of days ago - 2 males and 4 females. I recently joined the Aquaria Central forum and have already learned a lot - that's why I joined this site, too. I read up on what to expect buying them from pet stores (Pet Land, in my case)...and everything I was warned about was true - the crabs were submerged in freshwater.

I purchased both plankton and carnivore food (both because of what I read along with what the guy at the store told me - but more because of what I researched).

I also bought aquarium salt before realizing that it was freshwater salt... and before learning that marine salt is what I want.

My tank is 25 gallons, but it's probably filled with 5-6 gallons. I bought a black mystery snail (then realized that if it doesn't get attacked by the crabs, it will die from the brackish water).

Here's a picture of my tank setup:
[Only Registered Users Can See Links.] [Only Registered Users Can See Links.]


Suggestions and tips, as well as general comments are greatly appreciated!
I know that I will have to find a working filter, as well as buy marine salt this weekend...and most likely use sand as well.


Thanks again!

[cocoa_pleco]

i havent kept these guys for a long time but dont they need more land?

[KcEE]

Hmm...yeah...i think they need more land. They don't always stay submerged.

[squirt_12]

they def. need more land. They like to go and just sit there on the land. The temp should be around 75F. Are the foods that you have enriched or have calcium in them?? they need to have calcium in their diet inorder for them to keep a good shell (outer body). You def. need a filter,which you said you are going to be getting which is good. Are those plants live or fake?? the crabs will eat any kind of live plant except hornwort. So becareful with the live plants.

EDIT - i looked at the photo and they are fake by the looks of it.

If you want some good info.....i helped this guy out the whole way through with his fiddler crabs and there are alot of posts with info if you would like to scroll through it. [Only Registered Users Can See Links.]

[GermanMusician]

they def. need more land. They like to go and just sit there on the land. The temp should be around 75F. Are the foods that you have enriched or have calcium in them?? they need to have calcium in their diet in order for them to keep a good shell (outer body). You def. need a filter,which you said you are going to be getting which is good. Are those plants live or fake?? the crabs will eat any kind of live plant except hornwort. So be careful with the live plants.

EDIT - i looked at the photo and they are fake by the looks of it.

If you want some good info.....i helped this guy out the whole way through with his fiddler crabs and there are a lot of posts with info if you would like to scroll through it. [Only Registered Users Can See Links.]


Wow, thanks a LOT!
Yes, the plants are fake... they use the plants and the rock occasionally, but, for some reason, only stayed out of the water for about the first hour I had them - at least as much as I have seen them...

I am planning to change my tank setup this weekend. I'm most likely going to dump out all of the water, and move my gravel over to the right side of the tank and add some sand to create a sloped land. I'm hoping to then move the rock over to the left side (and rotate it) so that it is in the water, but sticks out. I will also have some plants... hopefully that will be enough options for dry land for them???

The other link you provided was also helpful - thanks!

[squirt_12]

well IMO....i would take the sand and make it slope out of the water (if this isn't already what you are doing) so that the crabs have something to walk on and dig in if they want to. The air should be humid as they ALWAYS need to have moisture on them..i they dry out they die....but when you ahve a heater on tehre it should be humid. Make sure that you have the back and front of the tank covereed to keep the humidity in. But it isn't a major issue as they can just go back into the water.

what are you feeding them??

is there anything else in the tank??
if there is nothing then you can add some feeder guppies and they will breed like crazy and it makes the tank look more livly. I had about 6 in my tank and in a couple months i now have about 60 of them. lol.

EDIT - if you have any questions at all about fiddlers you can either PM me or just leave a post about it and i will try to answer it as best i can.

[GermanMusician]

I'm giving them Hikari tropical sinking carnivore pellets. I don't think they've got extra calcium in them... I've also got some freeze dried plankton, because I read that they like that, too... but I've only put those in about once.

Any food you recommend?

By the way - I had no idea that you have to keep the back covered for moisture reasons - I thought they got out of the water to dry their shells from time to time. Thanks!

[tootie123]

You can see if they'll take ghost shrimp. They have lots of calcium.

[squirt_12]

well you can leave the back open but it is better for them just incase so that they don't dry out totally. Also...when you have the tank heated more water will evaporate and if you keep it closed then you wont lose mugh water and it looks cool against the side of the glass.

some food that i would use in hakari crab cusine. Thats what i use and is good for them. Ghost shrimp are ok but they might not beable to catch them. but if they can go for it. also you could feed shrimp pellets, algae wafers, frozen blood worms.

[GermanMusician]

Thanks a lot!

[cocoa_pleco]

wouldnt puting ghost shrimp in a small shallow bowl for the crabs work so they can easily catch them?

[squirt_12]

wouldnt puting ghost shrimp in a small shallow bowl for the crabs work so they can easily catch them?
yeah....but the shrimp will just jump out and sort of flop until they hit water....i have tried.....unless they are freshly dead???

[GermanMusician]

Wow...

So I've had the crabs for less than a week, and just found one of the females dead. How sad...:scry:

I wonder if it's because the water doesn't have marine salt yet?
Or maybe because I don't have an operating filter just yet. (My friend will be getting one to me this week).

If anyone can help me, I saw her floating at the surface of the water, with bubbles around her...

:help: ??

[squirt_12]

hhmmm......thats very odd. It shouldn't have been cause of the salt cause you can have them in freshwater for a while but they eventually get sick and die. But i would get salt ASAP.

that is weird...are you sure it wasn't just a molt?? they will molt their shell.Also..when they do molt their shell...leave it in there as they will eat it and get the calcium out of it.

sorry to hear about your loss :(

[GermanMusician]

Thanks...
I did think to check to make sure it wasn't a molt - and it wasn't...
I wonder if it's probably just because they're from a pet store... one that kept them in freshwater with no land whatsoever...
I might be able to go out today to buy marine salt, sand, and ghost shrimp (or some other form of calcium)

[squirt_12]

Thanks...
I did think to check to make sure it wasn't a molt - and it wasn't...
I wonder if it's probably just because they're from a pet store... one that kept them in freshwater with no land whatsoever...
I might be able to go out today to buy marine salt, sand, and ghost shrimp (or some other form of calcium)
just look at some crab pellets and most of them have calcium in them. THats how my fiddlers get their calcium.

[GermanMusician]

So, I went out to buy stuff today, and I got marine salt, Hermit Crab Cakes (which are just little pellets - they do have calcium in them), Ghost shrimp, another crab to replace the one that died, a filter that I have to return (because it turns out that i just bought the sponge for the filter - no wonder it was 15 bucks), and some "sand" that turned out to have some clay in it, so it leaves the water permanently cloudy... hope the crabs don't mind!

I put in about 2.5 gallons of new distilled water, but a lot of it seeped into the sand and stuff... so I put in one tablespoon of the marine salt... because I remembered reading somewhere that you should put in about 2 tbsp per gallon, but I figured I'd be safe and put less just in case... not to mention, I would like the snail to live if at all possible. However, if the freshwater mystery snail dies in my clay-filled brackish water, I won't be devastated... I am more worried about the crabs.

Anyway, should I put in more marine salt? Should I continue using any aquarium salt? Should I still feed them the sinking carnivore pellets (without calcium) and freeze-dried plankton?

Since I changed my tank setup around a lot, here it is:

[Only Registered Users Can See Links.]

[Only Registered Users Can See Links.]

By the way, the thing hanging around in the back of the tank is a heater - it's taped at the top of the back wall so that the power cord won't fall into the water... but that's the best I can do - the water level doesn't go high enough for where the heater would usually sit in the tank.

Thanks!

[squirt_12]

very nice tank......did you clean the sand before putting it in the tank??? if you did that would have helped alot to keep the water not dirty. But once you get a filter running in there then it should clear up.
The food that you got is great. The stuff i use says that you can use it for hermit crabs aswell. But yes you can still feed the other stuff but make sure they get some of the stuff with calcium in it as they need it.
The heater should really not be like that becasue if you are supposed to have so much water up so high on the heater then i wouldn't use it unless there is enough water. What i use is a little heater that is submersible. I use a tetra submersible heter like in the link. [Only Registered Users Can See Links.]
There is no point in using aquarium salt while you are using sea salt. I use about 1tbsp per gallon. But if you had a hydrometer then it should read about 1.008 - 1.010. Around there is a good salinity.

[GermanMusician]

So, the new Hermit Crab food I gave them (which has calcium) is not getting eaten... any clues as to why? I figured that if that's the only food I leave out for a period of time, eventually they'll get hungry enough to eat it, right?
Should I switch to the other food?
How should I serve the new food... I've tried placing it in the water and on dry land... because I wasn't exactly sure how they'd take it... (it floats in the water, by the way.)

:help: ?


Thanks

[squirt_12]

OMG...sorry i didn't see this before...i am sooo sorry.

How are you feeding the food to them??? in the water?? on land???
try putting it in a little dish.
how much are you feeding???
they might eat it if they go hungry but hard to say.

what is the other food??
if they are not eating the calcium suplimated food them i would try half and half of the other food and see if they eat either or.

since it floats...the calcium food....then put it ina little dish on the land with some water in it so that it obsorbs some of the water.

keep me updated...sorry i didn't notice this earlier.

[GermanMusician]

Oh, that's totally alright, no problem!

I might've found a method that works. If I just leave the calcium-enriched food in there for a while, then it will end up sinking... I THINK they eat it then...

I also tried the food dish, but they decided to neglect it and eat the clay-sand substrate instead.

I just replaced everything in their tank... The clay was an absolute nightmare. I have white live sand in there, and now I can actually see everything in the tank...

Thanks for your help!

[squirt_12]

kk

no problem.


keep me updated on if they are eating or not. i would like to know how they make out.
best of luck.