hermit crab reef safe?

P

Philip.Cloete

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Hi all

Someone brought me a bottle of hermits from the ocean with some snails ect.
He did not know that you cant just put any sea creatures toghether so it was kin of a surprise to me.

Anyway can you guys please tell me if the stuff I got is safe.
I will put fotos on as soon as the come out of the shells ect.

Another question is all hermits reef safe. If they are why do they only sell blue legged and red legged these ones has a kind of white leg

I will appresiate your answers.

If they are not compatible at least it is only about 6 crabs and 5 snails so I dont think it is too much damage done
 
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that is a Yellow tip hermit. The best in my opinion local hermits to add to your system. They get max to 28mm, so rather small compared to others.

I got loads of them, from less than 5mm to fully grown.
 
Surprisingly, you do get a few that do survive, but generally not long term. Even though they seem to live in rock pools which at times exceed the temps we run our tanks at, and some pools have normal to hyper salinity fluctuations, very few snails make it past 6 months. Most however die within the first few days.
I would not recommend adding life from our WC waters to your tank.
 
although day time temperatures at the west coast can be high in the rock pools, it is not for a very long period. Next high tide and the pool is cold again. The rock pool inhabitants can tolerate that. They cannot handle constant 24/7 higher temperatures. Rather leave them in the rock pools, unless you got a a chiller and run your system as a cold water tank. Below 18 degrees.
 
Cool, thanks for the advise,
i was looking to restock my cleaning crew,
But seeing the R70 price for a hermit crab made me think of stealing from the ocean:p
 
I'm not if you can get cushion starfish in durban,
But is anybody interested in trading Cushion startfish with hermit crabs and snails?
We each cover our own postage,
Maybe you @RiaanP , considering you've got harlequin shrimps to feed:p
 
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By the way, cushion starfishes will happily live in the fridge for long time,
I've kept 5for 6weeks now,
and added more to it 2 weeks ago, and all are happy
 
yeah, I'm in Centurion. I moved my cushion stars to safety, away from the harlequin shrimps. But yes, having extra would be nice.
 
Last time I added hermits or snails was in July last year.
Snails, no, the numbers I have stabilized and they are happy.
Hermits, not sure how many are left. They are all in different tanks. First need to do a proper count before I can decide on taking any out. Seriously not even sure how many are there.


I did go searching last night for the harlequin shrimps. They are in my display, deep under the rockwork. Not going to be easy to get them out. Might be forced to add cushion stars later for them.
 
RiaanP said:
Last time I added hermits or snails was in July last year.
Snails, no, the numbers I have stabilized and they are happy.
Hermits, not sure how many are left. They are all in different tanks. First need to do a proper count before I can decide on taking any out. Seriously not even sure how many are there.


I did go searching last night for the harlequin shrimps. They are in my display, deep under the rockwork. Not going to be easy to get them out. Might be forced to add cushion stars later for them.
Click to expand...


That's cool, next time I got to the coast I will collect for you and will send it to you
You can send me back hermits when you have some available
 
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