Hermit Crabs

[smeagol]

just wondered what other people do with their hermits. I have kindly been buying mine bigger and bigger shells to grow into, nice fancy ones.... they now look very grand! i went to purchase a few more and mentioned this to the guy at the lfs who said this was not a good idea and to restrict the size they get to by not offering any new shells !
Does anyone else do this ?

 

[chrissaysyes]

I do...excpet for the fancy part.

 

[1entra]

Yea I also keep adding shells for the hermits to grow into as Ive read up somewhere that if adequate shells are not made available, the hermits can turn to attacking and eating snails and taking their shells instead.

Also like chrissaysyes I have never got any fancy shells, just ordinary ones from my LFS

 

[chrissaysyes]

Also when I get my hermits (dwarf blue legs) theyre usually VERY small. Topping off with crushed coral substrate often turns up a LOT of new tiny white shells for them.

 

[Donya]

i went to purchase a few more and mentioned this to the guy at the lfs who said this was not a good idea and to restrict the size they get to by not offering any new shells !

This is a recipe for bad events. If you have a lone hermit with no snails or other hermits, it will keep growing and only have its very back end stuck in the shell. I've seen hermits like that, and they become quite unhappy and hop into a new shell at the first opportunity. Also, if you have more than one hermit or any snails, outgrowing a shell generally triggers a whole lot of agression because they're desperate for a new home (and tend not to be very good at judging the size of what they're fighting over). In short, you can't restrict a hermit's size by restricting shells. Even with that fact aside, the idea of deliberately stunting an animal's natural growth rate is pretty bad IMO.