hermit question

[tripleup05]

I know I need to get some more crabs and snails for my cleanup crew, but I'm wondering if established hermits are ever aggresive towards new ones. The ones I have are relatively small, but I have one who is huge. I dont remember the name of it offhand, but it has black and white striped legs. I'd say its shell is about an inch long. That may not be huge, but compared to my others it is. he isnt aggresive at all towards the other hermits, but I wanted to make sure it wouldnt be to any new ones I get, because i'm sure none will be as big as he is. Thanks!

 

[Jolieve]

Zebra hermits, also called left-handed hermits because their left claw is much larger than their right, probably sold to you as a dwarf variety. Some of these will stay small, some of them will not. It's very hard to distinguish the ones that stay small from the ones that get big.

I have never had any problems introducing more zebra hermits to my bunch. When I introduced the hermits to the tank, I did so in small batches of five, a few months apart. (This is not how you have to do it, it's just how I happened to do it because I didn't have tons of time to make it to the LFS, and he never had many of the hermits at a time). I didn't have any losses when adding new hermits in this way. So I think you'll be fine adding more hermits now.

Good luck,
J.

 

[tripleup05]

Thanks for the reply. This seems to be the general answer on other boards.

 

[Anonymous]

Hermits are cool-looking, but that's about it, imo.

Many say that scarlet hermits are the most reef safe. Others, including zebra hermits, are hit or miss.

 

[Jolieve]

Oh mine don't bother corals, I just have to restock my snails every six months.

J.

 

[wyw]

I agree my hermits don't bother my corals but are constantly killing my snails and each other. One large LH hermit even killed my peppermint shrimp. The only hermits that don't seem to kill each other or the snails are the scarlets.