Hermit Crab Habitat Ideas

Do you have a pet hermit crab and still need how to keep it healthy? Hermit crabs usually live in a tropical environment, but they are social creatures that can thrive in your house up to ten years if you provide them with almost a natural habitat. Hence, we would like to help you make it live a long healthy life with these Hermit Crab Habitat Ideas.

Choosing A Suitable Habitat

You may use a fish tank or any pet enclosure that is made of glass to create a habitat for your pet. Make sure the tank is with at least 15 gallons of space for each pair of crabs and at least 5 gallons for one crab. Also, make sure the tank has a lid that keeps the crabs in, since they are really great climbers, and holds humidity. Remember that crabs don’t breath air but through gills, so they would slowly suffocate if the humidity is less than 75%, which means your habitat shouldn’t be made from plastic as it doesn’t keep humidity well. Also, remember not to use a metal habitat because crabs are extremely sensitive to it.

What should the habitat contain?

Of course, you know how much hermit crabs love burrowing and digging tunnels, so you need to fill the habitat with 6-10 inches of play sand or special sand for hermit crabs. Then provide your lovely crabs with objects to play with and some places to hide in. Actually, some big hermit crab shells can be the best choice for that matter. Make sure to provide at least two shells for each crab and change them with bigger ones as your crabs grow and use them for housing.

Adding two deep bowls of fresh and marine saltwater would be great for the hermit crabs to drink and wash, too. So your small crabs don’t sink, you may add a sponge in the bottom of the bowl to help them get out easily.

Light and Temperature

To give your hermit crab a chance to stay healthy, happy, and comfortable, you need to simulate your hermit crab habitat with the right amounts of light and temperature.

A normal cycle of 12 hours of light and dark is significant for your pet’s moulting process, in which they change skin and get too vulnerable. Use a LED or fluorescent bulb inside your crab hermit habitat to light it from 8 to 12 hours a day, and note that crabs don’t need light at night. As for the right temperature, as you know, crabs are cold-blooded creatures, so they need you to provide a heater under one side of the habitat, but save the crabs from getting uncomfortably hot buy adding at least one inch of bedding between the heater and the habitat. You may also want to add a thermometer to make sure the temperature stays between 72-82 °F (22 °C) because if it gets lower, they will get sick and might not survive.

We hope our hermit crab habitat ideas would help you provide a safe enclosure for your new pet.

Below are some photos of more ideas for Hermit Crab Habitat.