Luna Tail

Well the crabs are in their new, permanent, home. I think they are happy. Humidity is staying up, Temp is steady. they cruised around a bit this morning but now are resting, fighting, or being more mellow. To the left is a picture of the crabitat. To the right is a picture of a crab in the back of the tank. I cannot tell the crabs apart, I wonder how people do that! They look very similar to me and I don’t know if more than one of them has switched shells.

Well they are cuties for sure. I am actually going out of town tomorrow for a week, so my friends are going to help take care of them until I get back. I wrote them a big long email and showed them the ropes, so I think these three guys will be fine.

I will try to post while I am gone, but I might miss a bit!

Yikes! The Hermit Crabs come tomorrow! They are on their way now, as I type this, overnight delivery. I’m going to get three of them. I have a temporary crabitat setup at home so they will stay here with me at night, then I’ll take them to work where I have their permanent setup, tomorrow.

Soooo…. I’m nervous! I hope they are okay.

Well, looks like I am going to need a humidifier. In less than 48 hours the humidity in the tank has dropped from 78% to 58%. That’s after I put the sand in, and the sand was fairly moist. So this is what I get for living in the desert!

So I’ll be putting one together, probably a DIY humidifier, and setting it into the tank before I get any land hermit crabs. Gotta have the crabitat right first!

Okay.. well, here is the setup! I have the sand in and the UTH on the back. Near the heater it temp is 79F. Away from the heater on the far front corner the temp is 77F. Hrm, I wonder if that should be a warmer spread. I’m not sure, I’ll have to read up.

The humidity is about 70%. That needs to be about 80%. I have to wet down the sand more, I think that will increase the humidity. I need to get some declorinator first, though, as I don’t want to just throw tap water in there.

It’s coming along. I’m now checking out some medium land hermit crabs to populate the tank with. I’m thinking 3 at first. Maybe 4. I’d eventually like to get 5 total, but we’ll see how that goes.

And I want to knit a hemp hammock to put in, but I need to find where to buy some good undyed hemp. And I’d like the back to have a climbing wall, probably a tightly knitted hemp climbing wall.

I’m getting excited!

Which, in any other context, might sound like a bad thing. I put the sand in the tank today and, of course, forgot my camera. I’ll have to take some pics next week.

I plugged in the UTH - Under Tank Heater - and put in my thermometer and humidity meter. So it’ll go all weekend and when I get back I’ll see what the temp and humidity are, and then adjust accordingly.

I hope some crabbies like this tank. I put about 2.5 inches of sand in. I have more, if the crabs I get are bigger than this. But I think I want hermit crabs about that size.

[tags]hermit crabs, crabitat[/tags]

I stopped by Home Depot last night and bought sand. And it has no silica in it, so I’m pleased. I had some sand with silica and had to ask if they have any without, which they did. Sand is very cheap! And this beach sand is brown, which I like better than the stark white. It’s more natural.

So I’m going to bring it to work today, and hope to remember my camera, and set it up! Yay! Then I will wait for a few days to see how the temp and humidity are before putting crabs in.

Okay… tomorrow I plan on going and buying some play sand. I’d like to mix some shells in it… is it shells to add calcium? Now I forgot. But really sand is the only thing left that I need. And then I can start adding crabs.

Unfortunately the glass lid I bought is not fitting the tank perfectly. It is about 1/2″ too short length wise, and I think about 1/2″ to wide. I’m not sure what to do about it. I am probably going to try to rig something up, but I don’t know what, to get it to sit securely on the tank and not fall in, and yet be easy to remove, too. I think I have an odd tank size.

I’m excited, I want to get some crabs!

Not with crabs! I’m going on vacation for a week starting tomorrow, so won’t be posting until I get back. I did try the lid on the tank and it’s just a touch too narrow. Not sure how I’m going to fix that. I don’t want to send the lid back just for that. I might put something on the tank itself to hold it up.

I am busy busy busy with packing and getting dogs for rescue. So bye for now!

Woo Hoo. My glass lid came for the tank, and my thermometer and humidy meter. So all I really need now is sand. Oh and to knit up some hemp climbing things for them… ugh, hammocks that is what they are called. LOL my brain is not too sharp today.

I plan on getting play sand this weekend. Then this coming week at work I’ll set it all up! I’m excited. I hope this lid fits. I measured and I think it will be okay, but not 100% certain. I guess we’ll see.

gauge

My under the tank heater came yesterday. Yay! So now I can start getting the temp right. Well, I need to get the sand in there, first. maybe today I can stop at Home Depot and get some play sand. I wonder if I’m supposed to boil all of it to sanitize it. Boiling a lot of sand is not my idea of fun…

Hopefully my temp and humidity guages will come soon, too, so I can really get those two things going, they are most critical!