ok before i start to plan for an octo i would like to breed and care for crabs that way i can use them as food in the future! does any1 know what size aqurium i will need to house two crabs in? also i was wondering how many crabs a crab can usualy produce. i want to breed emerald crabs but maybe fiddlers would be easyer anyways i have alot to learn about crabs so please post advice. another thing i was wondering was if shrimp were easyer to breed and if they were better octo food.please help me!!!
PeACe
Tif

I suspect that with a bit of research you'll find breeding crabs on a scale large enough to use as a constant food supply will be much, much more expensive and time consuming than just ordering them.

Dan

i guess u r right. do u have any websites that sell live octo food that u would suggest, because shrimpstuff is currently out of stock on everything.
thanks
PeACe
Tif

Hear is a good site I was shown by Nancy: www.aquaculturestore.com
Best sorce of fiddler crabs I've come across.

Thanks a bunch :D But another thing............i need to know how to care for crabs and shrimp so i can keep them alive for my octo,so what kinda tank equipment do they need filter,pump,water type,tank size ect.
can they be kept well w/ shrimp? and what do they eat? also what size should they be for the octo to eat?
Thanks:)
Tif

get a baby pool
get a bunch of fiddlers from a bait shop or catch them or order them
fill one side of the baby pool up with sand half way
fill the other with water
put a small pump in the water
put the crabs in
they will breed after the new moon when the females shed their shells
a week later they will be plump with eggs
put a filter on the pump then
the females will lay the eggs in the water
make sure you have lots of food for the eggs (difficult to raise without this)
then start feeding the water
after about a month you will begin to see little itty bitty fiddlers on the sand
get the adults out then they will eat them
let the babies grow and presto cb fiddler crabs

its actually pretty easy as long as you provide enough food

Joefish- Very impressive knowledge.

So when the eggs hatch, what sort of feed will work? This is the difficult time, I imagine. Later they can eat flakes.

Nancy

So when the eggs hatch, what sort of feed will work? This is the difficult time, I imagine. Later they can eat flakes.

Nancy

I'd hazard a guess that they'd need very small plankton, or perhaps even rotifers. We don't have fiddler here but our small shore crab larvae feed on such things.

J

ive fed the babies by doing water changes with real water out the estuaries around charleston and its worked fine cause theres plenty for them to eat in there but i know most of yall dont have access to that...

i would imagine that REEF BUGS would be great for this or something similar like brine eggs etc

reef bugs would be fine not sure about brines tho'

J

crabs are scavengers and will eat anything

crabs are scavengers and will eat anything
Not all of them are! Porcelain crabs are filter feeders and although Swimming crabs and Cancer Crabs scavenge they will take clams!

J

fiddler crabs actually filter algea and leftover food etc out of the sand

hey joefish,

I was wondering if you could provide any insight on how your fiddlers handle the winter up there in zone 8, provided that you have kept them overwinter outside. How often do they breed? How do they behave in cold weather? Any idea how they handle dramatic temperature and salinity fluctuations resulting from rainfall? If they could handle brackish conditions, this would greatly lower costs and allow me to cultivate a few plant species. Any info would be greatly appreciated. Having a perm source of octo food right outside my back door would be fairly snazzy. Not to mention having my own private "beach!"

I have a 75 gallon I have considered turning into a mangrove tidal tank with fiddlers. However, I wouldnt need to fork out my savings on a lighting system for a kiddie pool on the patio under sunlight. Im guessing it wouldnt look half bad either! Fortunately for me red mangroves grow in zone 9B even during hours of direct frost! I just need to figure out crab logistics and how to handle an average of 60" of annual rainfall in a saline dependant environment.

As I mentioned in another thread, I will be heading to the coast on Friday to collect as many species as possible. Its pretty much a done deal! The only major concern will be hauling buckets full of sand.

Thanks for the inspiration =)

We've been keeping fiddlers in a low plastic box for more than two years now. Ours are indoors, so I can't tell you about temperature. The interesting thing is they live in damp sand, come out at night to feed. Yes, they filter sand, but they will sink their little claws into pieces of fruit and they love popcorn. We feed them popcorn, flakes (on the sand), fresh fruit and lettuce. Although they occasionally eat the lettuce, they also use it to cover their holes.

They have a "pond" of brackish water but spend time there only during molting. Each night the "tide" comes in (water is poured onto the sand).

Never had any luck with breeding, but they're not so difficult to keep.

Nancy

well around here the fiddlers go down into the holes for hibernation after the water temp drops below about 67 deg F. so most the winter we dont even see them. being in fla you shouldnt have a problem. just put a heater in the tank to keep the water temp up and the cold air shouldnt affect them

I just got about 50-70 fiddlers at Yankeetown this weekend. If you go to the boat ramp past the bridge there is a cleared beach to the right that has TONS of fiddlers. So many that next time we go we are going to bring a large fish net and some plastic tarp material to try to herd them into the netting. I just got them to create ammonia.