Hermit crabs good or bad

[Reefkeeper14]

Recently i ead a thread about hermit crabs in the home aquaria and was wondering what you all thought about it most of the hate was directed to the blue hermit crab. Because people claim they will kill and eat a snail even when the aare being fed properly so i wanted to know what you all thought about i personnoly love watching ,y her,its eat algae and find new shells plus they are useful when you Have a small fish die

 

[Sfgiants55]

I have 10 in a 28g they do work! But one ate my nassiarius snail alive! It was kinda cool to watch haha

 

[Rockadile]

They do it for their shells. Keep various sizes of empty shells in your tank and you lower the odds of them doing this.

That said, I hate hermits. They are little thieves and if it was not for them doing such a good job at what they do I wouldn't have any

 

[Sfgiants55]

Yea he got the shell haha I put bigger ones in to but they didn't take to them!

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

Never had then eat my nassaurius snell. Someone made a good point earlier. They may not be eating the snails but cleaning up dead ones. We all know that some snail die for one reason or another.

 

[JackoChang]

I've had various hermits eat live snails, for the shells. As said earlier, if it want for their usefulness...

I do have a Halloween hermit that doesn't do much in terms of algae, but is great to look at.

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[jstlsn]

I have always had hermits in my tank. IMO the benefits out weigh losing a few snails.

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

I had ones of the anemone hermit craps at one time. You know the ones with nems on there she'll it was cool until it ate my GBTA and was suspected of eating my clown pair that hosted the nem. I traded it for a new pair of clowns though. Personally I don't see no benefits from them. My smells take care of the algae and my serpent stars clean up leftover food at night. I guess maybe the help with fish scat but I use it to feed my corals when I blow off the rock. Im not against them just cautious you know. I'm sure I'm not the only one that is this way. Lol

 

[bige]

I've had nothing but trouble with hermits. They knock things over and eat things their not suppose to. I have one. But he's small.

 

[Southside_Reefer]

I had over 300 blue legs in my 125 at one point. Yes it's true you'll catch them eating snails everyonce in a while but with that many blue legs and around 20 snails only about 3-4 of them got eaten

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

Makes since because the will fight each other for shells too.

 

[BarbH]

Great topic, was actually going to post this myself tonight when I got home. Had found some hermits mixed in with some of my snails that came in my cuc package and trying to decide between giving them a chance in the main tank or allow them to act as a small cuc for the qt tank. At this time leaning towards giving them a chance in the main tank and keeping an eye on them for the time being.

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

Worst case you will have to take them out but at least it isn't like trying to catch a rogue tang or angelfish. Good luck.

 

[BarbH]

Worst case you will have to take them out but at least it isn't like trying to catch a rogue tang or angelfish. Good luck.

My thought exactly after having read others responses. They are fairly easy to catch and if they don't seem to work out in the main tank I can always make a home for them in the qt tank.

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

The only problem with putting them in your QT is if it becomes a hospital tank. Copper will make short work of them. As far as catching them it isn't nothing. If you don't want to get your hand wet just buy one of the cheap plant thing at petco if you have one. It is made for trimming plant and positioning them in the tank. It has a two sets of pincher like thing one has blades the other is for gripping if tha made any since. Lol

 

[BarbH]

Good point on the possibility of any treatment that may need to be done in the qt tank. As for getting my hands wet that is just part of the fun of the hobby, I would be more worried of getting a hermit deciding to latch on although these guys are so small it would be nothing. I have had land hermit crabs before and have had them decide to latch on, bit of a shock when that happens.

 

[REEFKEEPER10]

I have met employees at petco that were scared to get the hands wet so I how to put that out there just incase. Well if you have to use the qt for a hospital then you could just trick of your other half and use one of the tufferware containers and a air stone. Lol

 

[BarbH]

I have met employees at petco that were scared to get the hands wet so I how to put that out there just incase. Well if you have to use the qt for a hospital then you could just trick of your other half and use one of the tufferware containers and a air stone. Lol

LOL, no other half to worry about so the sky is the limit on how I want to do things, although might make the boyfriend think I finally lost it if I started using tupperware containers :bigsmile: I do have another 20 gallon that should be free in the next week or two when he takes my fw angel pair. Already thinking of how I can use that sometime down the road, also have an empty 50 gal long that I am trying to decide if I want to keep or try to sell.

 

[Reefkeeper14]

so does anybody think that some colors of hermits eat more snails and are more destructive than other colors?

 

[caudill187]

Love my hermits. It is really amazing how much cleaning they can do in a short period of time. I feel like I often take these little guys for granted.