Hermit Crabs Nocturnal and Quirky Behaviors!
Hermit crabs are nocturnal and in the wild, forage for food at night and rest during most of the day. As pets, hermit crabs can be quite active during the day but most will be even more active at night.
What do hermit crabs do at night?
- forage for food, eat, drag food into tunnels
- wade in their water pools
- change shells
- dig up any plants you’ve just added
- look for new spaces to squeeze into
- find and inspect anything new
- climb all over their crabitat
Hermit crabs forage for food at night in the wild
Hermit crabs don’t eat very much. But it’s important to feed them every day and with a healthy variety of foods regardless. Don’t be surprised if those chunks of banana or pieces of popcorn you feed them completely disappear by morning! Hermit crab pets LOVE to drag food down into their tunnels, an activity mostly done at night.
Tip: feed your hermit crab pets at night when you eat dinner. Then leave the food until the next morning (if it’s moist or you’re trying to avoid unwanted pests) or until your next dinner time. The food will be fresh overnight when they are most likely to be looking for food, and it’s a feeding habit that’s easy to make! Want more info on hermit crab food and nutrition, click here!
Hermit crabs wade in their water pools at night
In the wild, hermit crabs are most vulnerable when they go to find and drink water. Naturally they prefer to do this at night. But as pets, hermit crabs are often observed drinking and wading in their water pools during the day as well. Don’t have a water pool? Consider making one! Hermit crabs love submerging in water (not just drinking it), most especially if there is moving water. Check out our blog post on adding moving water to your crabitat for under $15!
Change Shells
Hermit crabs will try to dig up ALL plants you add to their habitat!
Hermit crabs are VERY curious creatures! And they LOVE digging! If you add plants to your crabitat, they WILL dig them up! It’s nearly impossible to keep live plants in a hermit crab habitat successfully. Do they love the plants, or do they love the digging and climbing on top of them? It’s a nighttime activity hermit crabs love, so if you’re looking to give your pets a little extra fun, add a plant or two!
Plants added to water bowl.
Morning after plants were added!
What the heck happens at night?!
We added 3 weighted plastic aquarium plants to the hermit crab water dish.
Then…
We found THIS in the morning! They toppled two of the plants (they have a weighted bottom base) and DRAGGED the 3rd plant OUT OF THE BOWL and inches away!! HOW THE HECK DO THEY DO THESE THINGS! And always at night… !!! : )
Hermit crabs love defying logic to fit into crazy tight coconut openings! haha ahha
Look for new spaces to squeeze into
Hermit crabs find ways to squeeze into places seemingly impossible! New hermit crab pet owners sometimes worry in the morning when their hermies seem to have disappeared.
It’s important to remember that nighttime activities include burrowing, tunneling and climbing into all kinds of spaces you may not even realize exist.
If you don’t see your hermit crabs one morning, don’t worry! Don’t start digging or moving things around. They’ll come back out when they’re ready (probably at night!).
Find and inspect anything new
Hermit crabs LOVE exploring at night. In the wild they climb up and down trees, through mangroves out to the ocean shoreline, and back. They burrow and tunnel and find new places to hang out. Exploring, climbing and finding new spots to hang out are fun and stimulating to them.
For this reason, it’s very important to add new elements to your crabitat regularly. Switch their food from one side of the crabitat to the other, add moving water, add (artificial) plants, give them new extra shells, add a new climbing branch.
Most especially if your hermit crabs are looking bored, inactive, listless… adding a new element to their crabitat will most likely perk them up and make them happy again!
Climb all over their crabitat (sometimes LOUDLY!)
If your hermit crab habitat enclosure is glass, chances are you’ll KNOW your hermit crabs are active at night because you’ll hear them! It’s a good idea not to keep a crabitat in a bedroom because they DO make noise! Hermit crabs, while climbing all over their crabitats at night, will inevitably bump up against the glass. They are masters of inspecting every inch of every element within their crabitat, and this activity is on full blast at night!
Night vision motion-activated trail cameras for fun photos and videos!
If you really want to know what your hermit crabs do at night, use a night vision trail cam! The model we use is motion-activated and takes both photos and video.
We have our camera mounted on a short tripod and we sit it in front of our crabitat at night. When hermit crabs move in front of the camera’s line of sight, the motion sensor will start recording!
The camera model we use (the one in that Amazon ad is the one we have) is battery-activated and lasts for months before needing new batteries. It’s easy to set up, and fun to sift through the photos and video to find the nocturnal and quirky behaviors of our hermit crabs!
This camera works great outside if you may have fun critters out back like foxes, deer, raccoons or point it towards your koi pond to see what happens at night!
Do your hermit crabs do anything at night we haven't included here? Please share! We especially love funny hermie stories 🙂
Last update on 2024-04-19 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API