red legs and blue legs?

[pomme]

do these crabs eat the same algae, or do they tend to like different ones, as i have seen today that my local lfs now sells both.

so i was thinking about which one was better? do you guys have any preference?

or do you think they will be able to be kept together if supplied with enough food if their is not enough algae?

 

[steve-s]

Hermit crabs are scavengers. As long as there is detritus, uneaten foods and various types of algae about, they will find a meal. There is no need to worry about them going hungry unless the population is larger than the food supply. Stick within that, build your crew slowly and you should not have a problem.

For a 100 gal tank, you could quite easily have a mixture of both the blue and red. Start out with about 10-15 of each so as not to overdo it. Personally, I like zebra hermits as I have found them to be the least aggressive and do not generally prey on snails as long as "housing" is otherwise provided.

Don't forget the snails....

Cheers
Steve

 

[BBReef]

we tried both in our 60 gal, but all the red legs died off and the blue legs lived. didnt know why, they just did. so i only have blue legs.

 

[loganj]

Note that there is a difference between red legs and scarlet hermits. Not that one is any better or worse than the other, they are just different. The only problem I have with the larger hermits is that they knock things over as they prowl around the tank.

 

[pomme]

i was thinking of having about 40 snails and 10 hermits,

these were
18 turbo snails,
6 super snails,
6 cerith snails,
6 nassarius snails,

6 red legs and 6 blue legs, or just 10 red legs?

does this sound okay?

would you go for just red legs or the mixture,

thanx.

 

[steve-s]

To be honest, you don't need the hermits at all with the mix of snails you have chosen. Unless you are having hair algae problem, that is going top be the only benefit of the hermits. You could opt to increase the amount of nassarius and nix the hermits completely.

If you decide to keep the hermits, there is little or no difference between the two you've chosen.

Cheers
Steve

 

[pomme]

humm now thats changed my ideas a bit as now if i just up the snails a bit i will be able to get rid off the crabs and wont be worried about them in the tank eating the snails,

illh have to think about this one,

 

[TriggerHappy]

I just picked up a red leg and blue leg crab along with a turbo snail. They all seem to be doing well, just the litte one has a hard time getting around the larger cc. Think I'll get a few more...cheers! Oh yeah, mine seem to be muching on the algae

 

[bsheek]

What size is your tank? Multiply your gallons by 1.5 and thats the combo of snails and crabs you need. Try this site http://garf.org/ great info on the many different kings of algae growth and what eats eat. Example...if you have the green algae problem you want NERITE SNAILS...if you have red slime algae you want MEXICAN DWARF HERMIT CRABS.