Not For the Faint of Heart: Hermit Crabs Breeding

The title is not at all an exaggeration. Pet hermit crabs breeding is not an easy task. On the Internet you can find different opinions moreover. Many experts are of the view, that hermit crabs never have been successfully bred in captivity. However, others are of the opinion that it is very very difficult but not impossible. Indeed chances of a successful breeding are very low. First, you have to ensure that you have a male and a female inside your cage for breeding to happen. It is rather hard to tell the difference between a girl and a boy hermit crab with exotic pets that hardly even come out their shells, so you had best ask for a pair of them from the pet store you buy them from to save you the trouble of distinguishing between male and female hermit crabs.

Hermit crabs breeding isn't easy as it seems to be

There will be a few complications you will come across because you are trying to simulate their natural hermit crab breeding habitat. Female land hermit crabs, for instance, lay eggs in the shallow depths of the sand. When the eggs hatch, the baby hermit crabs scamper away towards the ocean. This is something you will have to replicate in the confines of your home for you to be able to breed them successfully, so be prepared to provide these special conditions of environment if you are serious in your choice.

Do not think that since your pet hermit crab is not living in the wild, that they will not lay as much eggs as they would naturally do. You should actually be ready for a whole lot of eggs. The amount of eggs that will be laid will depend upon the size of the female crab and the conditions of the environment that they will breed in.

Here is a checklist on what to prepare and do for breeding hermit crabs:

• First Step:
  A salt water tank has to be set up. You may do this outdoors by making a garden pond if it is quite difficult for you to have a salt-water tank inside your house. However, several experts suggest that the outdoor option is more preferred.
• Second Step:
  It would be ideal if you could make waves. What this actually means is for you to create a device that can replicate the waves of the ocean. Hermits love this wavelike motion. Several zoologists believe that the movement of the ocean waves could even aid in the process of breeding. This does not mean, however, that you have to ask your spouse or anybody else to fan your pond in order to create these waves. You can purchase these wave machines on the Internet or from a local pet store. A good brand of this type of machine would have to be that of Sea Swirl Aquarium Wave Makers, which also happen to be quite affordable. There are also other brands in the market that you can try as well - just try to look for one that will suit your needs best.
• Third Step:
  Set up some moonlight bulbs. Ideally, it would be best to install them right around the pool or your tank. This also helps a lot with the process of breeding since all species of hermit crabs normally do this activity at night. As with the wave makers, moonlight bulbs can also be purchased on the Internet or from a local pet store. The price range is usually about fifteen dollars.
• Fourth Step:
  This is the tough part - ensuring that you have a female and a male hermit crab. You can skip through the hardships of this process by simply buying a pair especially for breeding. It may cost you, but this is way better than finding out their gender by yourself.
• Fifth Step:
  Make sure that your pond or tank temperature stays in between seventy-two and eighty degrees. This is the exact type of environmental temperature that hermit crabs thrive upon. When the temperature goes down even just a notch, it may render your hermit crab ill or weak.
• Sixth Step:
  Make sure to keep the air in your crab's environment clean and that light is adequate. Keep the temperature in tow and make sure the water stays salty. You also have to make sure that your hermit crabs have healthy foods with lots of calcium. When a crab is healthy, it is much more able to mate, as compared to those that are not in top condition.
• Seventh Step:
  Store loads of brine shrimp. The lives of your larvae hermit crabs highly depend on it. With all this in place, you can now put your crab pair in one place together and the rest is up to Mother Nature. Just let your crab pair alone for about three weeks. When hermit crabs mate, they do a sort of dance. You might want to watch out for this for it is quite entertaining.

It takes about one month or so until you will finally get to see land hermit crab babies. Before this happens though, it is advisable that you get a number of really small shells for when the baby crabs will go "ashore". Keep in mind that once they begin to migrate on land, they would be around five mm so it is important to get really tiny shells for them.

My recommendation for successful Hermit Crabs Breeding