good care if leaving town?

[kansas]

Is there any good way to take care of my 2 hermit crabs when I am leaving town? I have someone that can come by at times to check humidity and temp. Also to turn the light on and off. But she does not know much about hermit crabs. Any advice on food, water issues? I normally feed a fresh diet, but have seen specific vacation foods at the pet stores. Are those safe? I want them to be happy while Im gone!

[emmac350]

Don't feed the vacation foods. The easiest thing for the caretaker is to set up days of food in the fridge or next to the tank so that they just have to dump the bag (or bowl, or whatever you use to hold each day's food) into the food bowl. If you're afraid the food will go back, freeze it. It will thaw in the tank and I promise the crabs will be fine with ex-frozen food.

[Wai]

The vacation foods are just as bad as regular hermit crab food. I agree with Emma's advice.

[ladybug15057]

The vacation food they sell contains ethoxyquin. (not good) You do not mention how long you are leaving for?
But one can either freeze foods in the daily pill dispensers, or even in ice cube trays. Hermies as a rule will not eat the same food once they have eaten it for up to a week, usually 2 weeks. Try to put a varied diet in each section from the hermie pyramid to ensure they get the vitamins and minerals they need. For water, you can buy a reptile reservoir. Buy one for fresh water and one for ocean/sea water. This will ensure they will have water until the sitter is able to drop in again. And using the reservoir, unless the water is dirty it can go a few days without being changed out too. Water reservoirs can be found in the reptile department at Petco and PetSmart and other mom and pop pet stores. The base is the same size, but one can buy smaller or larger bottles.

[CrabbyJo]

You didn't say for how long you will be gone, but when I went on a 5 day trip, I just got all dried foods and filled two dishes with a variety of these.
I also got some pet watering dishes with the reservoir in the back so the dish would stay full if the crabs drained it at all (sometimes I don't know what they do with all that water!).

they did fantastic and I worried for nothing.
But I was also pretty certain the temp and humidity would stay stable, but did have someone double checking the gauges for me while I was gone.

[Emeraldroots]

What does one do while they are away from home? My wife and I are planning a vacation in around June or so of next year for 1 week. Assuming we know noone to take care for our Hermit Crabs ( we don't have any yet), what would we do? From what Ive read they need daily monitoring. Humidity, water, food. Would it be impossible to survive without human intervention for a week? Are there any devices out there that could maintain humidity while we were away? Food? Water? I have a feeling the answer is no. Given all the research I have been doing over the weekend, it seems unlikely. I am really interested in having a few as pets but I would hate to be a bad owner and leave them for probably around closer to 8 days with no rescue in sight should an issue arise...as it likely would.
Any ideas?

Thanks for any feedback!

[Foxydiva3]

I can't say this is the best answer But I have a huge tank of crabs and have gone away for a week. My tank is around 50 gallons. I leave a huge Salt pool, A large Water dish, And A Large natural Sponge. I also went in the summer so the heat and humidity were good. For Food I left a large dish with All sorts of dried foods, Freeze dried blood worms, freeze dried Shrimp, Dried Spiralina, I bought some dried veggies from the reptile section and dried fruits from the bird section. All and All my tank of around 30 crabs came off fine. I had to clean the Food dishes right away I also had a small dish on the side with one of those time release fish feeders and they had nibbled on that as well. Worked For me not saying if it would work for much smaller tanks. good luck!

[ladybug15057]

I merged your post with another about when one is leaving for a few days. There are some ideas in the postings above. You mention about possibly not having anybody to check on them and this could be possible too. I would suggest to get an electronic temp controller (thermostat, not rheostat) for your warming device. This should help to maintain a warm side substrate temp for you. 'Practice' a week before you leave with your tank... as in where is the lid placed for the closest minimum humidity level required? Water reservoirs as in my post above. A food dish that cannot be upset is a must for mold reasons. (freeze dried and dehydrated foods will work here too) And when we leave during the summer for vacation I always preset the air conditioner too to maintain a steady temp in the house which makes it easier to maintain tank conditions too. (yep, trial run this a week before we go)

[Emeraldroots]

Thanks for merging it =). I figured I wasnt the only one who left town occasionally .

[ladybug15057]

Nope, and you're not the only one who seems to have a problem finding a hermie sitter.
Here is another link that maybe of some help:
http://crabbywiki.com/tiki-index.php?pa ... ation+Care