Crabbies, I'm so proud ;)

Today I checked on my hermit crabs. One of them was sitting on a wall, just chillin', and the other, bigger one was in his little nest under a fallen coconut wall. It looked pretty cosy so I hadn't moved the wall. But now, as I lifted it, I was met with the ugly sight of a hermit crab head, whiskers askew, eyes staring blankly at the sky (ceiling), sitting on top of a jumbled pile of legs and claws.

DEAD!!

Thought process: Great, now I have to pick out more bits of hermit crab. And you, you... crab, sitting on the wall, looking all innocent!! Crabs are supposed to be social creatures! Why did you kill your last tankmate? You guys were buddies, too. Anyway, you're so much smaller than he was. Freak.

I put on my latex dead-crab-removal gloves which I keep next to the tank at all times (you just never know) and set to work. At least this time all the body parts were in a neat little pile, instead of being scattered around the entire tank.

Which should have been my first clue.

The legs and stuff felt really light, so I peered inside them, and would you believe it? The little crab somehow sucked all the meat out of the big crab after killing them. Wow, maybe I should give them more food.

Nope, that was the second clue.

Then I noticed– wait, there's anther crab taking a nap in the corner of the tank. Hold on. There's two live crabs in the tank, and a dead crab in parts on a kleenex. WTF? Last crab census, there were only two crabs left. Did someone sneak a crab into the tank and think I wouldn't notice or something? Wow, I am pissed.

Clue #3.

It took me another two minutes of inspecting the hollow corpse to realize what should have been obvious to me all along.

My crab had been burrowing for days. The body didn't look like it had been attacked. There was only an exoskeleton. I still had two crabs.

My crab molted!!

OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD, I'm sorry I got mad at you, Little Crab!!

Wheeeeeee! I'm not a failure!! My crab molted!!

To celebrate they got a fancy guava & carrot salad and I tossed their substrate around and got it extra moist and lovely, plus I rearranged the rocks and filled a corner with substrate so that they could frolic around in it.