Not eating

[Titans]

Hello everyone,

I just purchased my first hermies 5 days ago and I am not sure if they are eating there pellet food. I grind it up and change it out daily regardless if they eat it or not. Is there anything that they will for sure jump on at first scent so I can make sure they are eating?

Thanks in advance...

[vckums]

Do you have any popcorn kernals? Pop them in the microwave with a little oil(no salt or butter). Put in their food dish and they will come out running.

As for the pellet food, throw it away. Commercial food from a pet store contains ingredients that can harm your hermit crab. It also has a pheremone in it to make the crabs want to eat only that. They need a rounded diet consisting of fresh meats, fruits and veggies and you can also add dried foods as well.

[HermieLove19]

mine love freeze dried shrimp but for some reason they only eat whats in the middle and leave what looks like an empty shell. is that normal?

[Mr.Crab]

freeze dried shrimp? u just put a whole shrimp inside and they'll chew on it? I didn't know crab food was addicting like that. I wanto buy some freeze dried shrimp.. how do you make it?

[Wai]

I'm thinking of abandoning commercial hermit crab food altogether. I haven't had any hermit crabs nibble madly away at the pellets, so I assume they're somewhat tasteless. I think obtaining nutrients from natural sources will be much healthier for hermit crabs.

[HermieLove19]

I never give them pellet food. it smells like cardboard and has stuff i can't pronounce in it. I get food from the hermitcrabaddictionstore.com . Thats where i got different types of dried shrimp, octopus, cuttlefish, fruits, vegetables, flowers, and seeds. the great thing about using eco earth as a substrate is you can plant seeds in it and watch them grow as a fresh treat for your hermies.

[krabby_katie]

Yeah. I get my food from thecrabbagepatch.com they're pretty great too. I have never given my hermies commercial crab food, and I'm not going to start. Try some dried bananas. Mine love them. They take it and hide it all over the crabitat. I recently found out that one of them loves walnuts even better. Just try different hermie safe foods.

[Titans]

Wow this hobby keeps getting better and better...thanks for all the great tips and sites to visit. Soooo many foods to choose from. Today I put cut up apples, mangos and chicken to entice the little fellows. The chicken was attacked but i'm not sure on the other stuff...i'll keep alternating foods to find there favorites.

[krabby_katie]

Awsome. Yeah, they usually like meat/fish a lot.

[HermieLove19]

i made mine a crabby patty tonight. they love kobe beef.