Hermit Crab Food and Nutrition
Hermit crab food and nutrition is fairly easy to figure out. Hermit crabs are scavengers and will try to eat most anything! However, to keep pet hermit crabs healthy and happy requires a wide variety of foods. They are omnivores and like all kinds of fruits, vegetables, meats and seafood and need a good amount of nutrients and minerals.
When feeding your hermit crabs, try to rotate and mix/match foods from the Hermit Crab Pets Food Pyramid’s main food groups:
- ocean-related
- fruits
- vegetables
- meat
- treats (healthy, natural)
Store-bought hermit crab foods?
There are lots of mass-produced foods for hermit crabs, available in big box stores and pet shops. Most of these foods contain meal worms, river shrimp, soybean meal and other fillers and usually come in pellet form. Don’t rely on these foods, not all hermit crabs like them, and not all of those foods are GOOD for your pets! Test different foods and provide lots of variety.
Best rule of thumb? Feed your hermit crab pets the fresh, nutritious foods that you eat (or should be eating for your own good health!). Check out [Hermit Crab Pets Can Make You Healthier]
When feeding your hermit crabs, remember where they came from!
Hermit crab food and nutrition should center around their original habitat and the foods they find there. Hermit crabs are born at the oceans-edge.
Hermit Crabs are SCAVENGERS!
They are scavengers. They eat (or will try) most anything BUT the list of what they PREFER will be much, much shorter!
For their best health, remember where your hermit crab pets originally came from and what they ate in that environment!
Hermit Crabs get bored with the same food over and over... like we do!
Hermit Crabs GET BORED if given the same food all the time. They generally aren’t very picky BUT are happiest with a larger variety and rotation of fresh healthy people foods.
Most store-bought mass-produced hermit crab foods in pellet form, aren’t good for hermit crabs and they don’t even view it as food. But luckily, there are so many great alternatives!
Food ideas from the Hermit Crab Pets Food Pyramid
Treats and Snacks
- scrambled eggs (and shells!)
- fish food flakes
- peanut butter
- cereals (unsweetened)
- rolled oats, wheats
- popcorn (natural)
- hisbiscus flowers
- jasmine flowers
- cuttlebone (great for calcium)
Fruits
- apples
- bananas
- mango
- coconut
- pineapple
- papaya
Ocean-related
- fish, shrimp
- clams, oysters, snails, mussels
- seaweed, algae, spirulina
- plankton, krill
- copepods
- seagrape
- coconut, mango
Vegetables
- microgreens
- kale
- spinach
- broccoli
- carrots
- celery
- corn
Meats
- chicken
- pork
- beef
- turkey
- bison
- (remember fish!)
Another great way of providing nutrition and variety for hermit crabs is growing your own microgreens. In just 5 days you’ll have fresh greens you can provide. We grow 2-3 microgreen clumps at a time (different varieties) and rotate them every week or so in our crabitat. Most microgreen varieties sprout in just 48 hours, ready to harvest in just 5-7 days. Cheap, easy and nutritious! See our post on growing microgreens by clicking below:
Provide lots of variety!
Just as we humans like different foods and get bored eating the same thing over and over, so do our hermit crabs. And just as we have our favorite foods, so do they! Give them variety, preferably fresh foods. Then supplement with a good hermit crab food. Don’t rely on those store-bought big-name hermit crab foods. They are filled with… fillers and cheap ingredients most hermit crabs won’t eat unless desperate. Buy a few different kinds of food, feed them what you eat (if you eat healthy) and rotate foods often! #1 tip: if you’re a healthy eater, save a few tiny portions of what you’re eating for your hermies!
Do you have other pets like fish? Reptiles? Birds?
There are lots of foods you may be feeding your other pets, that would good be good supplemental foods for your hermit crabs! Have…
–> Saltwater fish? Your hermit crabs will enjoy fish food flake foods and frozen
–> Koi in a backyard pond? Have them share some anacharis, aquatic plant leaves, pods
–> Birds? Cuttlebone is ALSO a very good source of much-needed calcium for hermit crabs and millet spray!
–> Turtles or a bearded dragon? They like many of the same foods
Check out the frozen food section of your local pet store. You’ll find a variety of foods for saltwater aquariums and reptiles that your hermit crabs will enjoy! There are frozen cubes that contain a lot of the ocean-related nutrition that your hermies will love. And fish flakes are a good supplemental snack food for them too!
Are YOU a healthy eater? Then do THIS!
SHARE!!! Eating an apple? Cut off a couple of tiny pieces for your hermies (they usually LOVE apples!). Cooking shrimp scampi for dinner? Save a shrimp before plunging it into seasonings and pasta sauce! If you eat healthy and are conscious about a balanced diet, chances are… your hermit crabs will love what you eat too, and thrive.
If you are a healthy eater and/or do a lot of cooking, get in the habit of saving a few small pieces for your hermies! Chances are, if you are focused on eating a well-rounded diet of non-processed foods… your hermit crab pets will love what you’re eating too.
Remove any uneaten food within 12 hours or so, to avoid spoilage and attraction of unwanted ants/pests
Don’t feed your pets processed foods. They aren’t good for you, and they aren’t good for your hermit crabs.
Personal note: I have never relied on store-bought food as the main food source for my hermit crabs. Their main source of food is always what I eat. I try to eat lots of fruits and vegetables, and I cook dinner 3-4 times a week. I cut a tiny portion of what I’m eating or cooking and give to my hermit crabs. I feed them at night around dinner time. I use store bought foods like fish flakes and some cool handmade hermie foods (Etsy) as a supplement to help provide any vitamins or minerals they might be missing. Going out of town? The store bought or packaged handmade mixes work well because they won’t decay as quickly as fresh strawberries (the worst!).
Another great source of extra variety is your local pet store’s frozen food section. There are great frozen cubes for saltwater aquariums that will give your hermies the krill, shrimp, plankton, squid etc that they’ll probably thank you for!
But remember. All hermit crabs are different. They won’t all like the exact same foods. VARIETY is the key to making sure your hermit crabs are getting the nutrition they need. Feed them multiple types of foods in each feeding.
Hermit Crabs Need Variety
Hermit crabs won’t all like the same foods. And because they are omnivores and scavengers, they need variety. Feed them multiple types of foods in each feeding, and make sure these foods come from all the right food groups.
Use the Hermit Crab Pets Food Pyramid for ideas and guidance if needed.
Best spot for food dishes in a crabitat?
If possible, food should be placed on a higher level than the substrate. Why? Sometimes ants or other pests can find the food and invade the crabitat if it’s close to a window or floor. Elevating the food helps protect the crabitat from unwanted issues.
For larger crabitats, it’s a good idea to have two food dishes in different areas of the crabitat. If there are multiple levels, place a small food dish on the bottom level if you have very small hermit crabs, and place a larger dish on an upper level.
Personal note: we use a small flat shell and place small pieces of food on it, and it’s on the bottom substrate level. This is for our very small hermit crabs. When they grow a little more, we will move that small food shell to an upper level.
The larger food dish is on a middle level in the crabitat (our crabitat is over 5 feet tall, 6 levels) and even the smallest of our hermit crabs eat from that one most nights.
Last update on 2024-04-27 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API