The Puffer Forum

Hi,
I'm thinking of keeping 2 to 4 blue leg hermit crabs with a GSP: this is only a very very very initial thought tho!
I've done some reading on here and other sites/forums, and it seems very confusing as to whether:
a) they can be kept in 'low' salinity (i.e. brackish/high end brackish vs. their usual full marine -> although my GSP would eventually be kept in near to full marine);
b) they are fully aquatic or not (maybe I just missed this point tho').

Does anyone have any info? Also, I know of people successfully keeping crabs with puffers by scattering lots of shells in the tank: has anyone got any stories to share on this etc?

TIA!

I'm the one that origionally wrote that. It worked for a while... I had a huge red leg that lasted a year. Your puffer will eventually eat the hermits.

[a] There are a variety of hermits, but the ones traded as marine aquarium species include one or two (possibly more) that can be kept at ~50% seawater strength, i.e., around SG 1.012.

There are terrestrial hermit crabs sold as pets as well as aquatic species. The terrestrial ones are the ones you sometimes see being sold on stalls in malls, often with painted shells. They will drown underwater, and while they need moisture (like, say, frogs) they are otherwise completely land-based life forms. You could possibly mix them well with mudskippers and fiddler crabs, but otherwise they have no place in an aquarium.

I'm with Pufferpunk re: puffers versus hermits. Not a terribly good idea. Even if the puffer doesn't kill the thing outright, it will nip and its feet and antennae, which will stress it no end.

Cheers,

Neale

Keeping predators with potential prey is a little unfair, sooner or later, your puffs going to notice them, and that's when you end up with mutilated and/or eaten crabs. If you want to keep hermits, set a tank up for them. The truth is you could have a fantastic marine tank with only inverts, and could stick some things in there that 100% couldn't live with your puffer...

reginator wrote:Keeping predators with potential prey is a little unfair, sooner or later, your puffs going to notice them, and that's when you end up with mutilated and/or eaten crabs. If you want to keep hermits, set a tank up for them. The truth is you could have a fantastic marine tank with only inverts, and could stick some things in there that 100% couldn't live with your puffer...

Hiya, oh, I really wouldn't have even thought of the idea if I hadn't read stuff on here and other places about it. I didn't sit down and go "hey, what can I use to clean my tank, oh I know, a blue legged hermit crab" (I never even heard of those until I came here!)
I know puffers eat molluscs and crustaceans; I used to feed my little F8 mussel and snails, but with reading other posts I thought that perhaps it was the toughness of the shell or something that helped keep hermits safe.

Please don't think I'm out for cruelty, I would never knowingly do something like that!

On the point pufferpunk makes, having kept them successfully for a year. I'm assuming this is the general principle whereby a puffer may turn on tankmates at any time (any tankmates, not just crabs but also fish like mollies, gobies and so on that have been housed with them as I also read is often done by puffer keepers on this forum). I.e. that "its a risk, period".
Pufferpunk, during the year you successfully kept them, did your puffer nip at them or whatnot, or did it just one day decide to try them for dinner?