Petsmart Not So Smart With Hermit Crab Care

One day, you decide to go to Petsmart, a pet store in the United States, to get some food for your cat. On that day, you decide to check out what other pets they have. You notice some pets, including guinea pigs, land hermit crabs, hamsters, and many others, but the hermit crabs really catch your eye due to their uniqueness. You then peer around the hermit crab tank and notice gravel, a temperature gauge that reads 50 degrees Fahrenheit, and a humidity gauge that reads 37% relative. You buy two hermit crabs and mimic the tank set-up, thinking that since a pet store had this particular set-up, it must be correct. When purchasing the hermit crabs, the person in charge of reptile care tells you that you should use tap water and that they require salt water. You then take your hermit crabs home.

About a week later, you notice one of the hermit crabs is dead while the other is shedding its skin. "]What am I supposed to do?" you think to yourself. You then go on the Internet to research hermit crab care and find out that the one shedding its skin is molting and the other died of stressful tank conditions. You also learn that the one that is still alive is under a lot of stress, so you decide not to change the conditions until it is done molting, knowing it’d be much more stressful to change its environment than to let it in the same, stressful environment it is already in. You also learn that hermit crabs really need 70-85% humidity, 70-85 degrees Fahrenheit temperature, salt water, chorline-free water, and much more.

Petsmart’s lack of hermit crab knowledge, lack of accurate pet care training for its employees, and horrific shipping conditions to its stores cause many animal deaths each year. According to Petsmart’s official care sheet, hermit crabs need 50-60% humidity. However, hermit crabs actually need 70-85% humidity. Also according to the care sheet, hermit crabs can be housed on gravel, when they actually should be housed on sand. If a hermit crab were to be housed on gravel, they would not be able to molt properly due to not being able to dig down into the gravel.

One day, I decided to check on the hermit crabs’ conditions in a local Petsmart and noticed that one of the hermit crabs was molting and was not separated from the rest! When a hermit crab molts while with other cage-mates, it is often cannibalized due to its extreme vulnerability. When I told the employee in charge of hermit crabs what was wrong, she didn’t even know about molting! She just put it in a small cup and put it in Petsmart’s back room without any food, water, or gravel. This does not mean that all employees are uneducated about hermit crab care, however, but many are.

On the Internet, there are numerous places to research on hermit crab care. Some places including:

• http://www.crabstreetjournal.com
• http://www.hermitcrabassociation.com
• http://www.hermitcrabs.tk
• http://www.epicureanhermit.com
• http://www.crabbytalk.com
• http://www.crabbiecove.ctryluv.net

More information about pet store cruelty and neglect:

• http://www.petsmartcruelty.com
• http://www.pet-abuse.com/pages/animal_cruelty/reporting_abuse/pet_stores.php
• http://www.freewebs.com/petstoretruth
• http://www.petstorecruelty.org/
• http://www.ntrs.org/cruelty_investigations.htm
• http://www.cavyspirit.com/petstores.htm
• http://petno_petco.tripod.com/
• http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=KblHOIdgf2Y