Information on freshwater crabs

[lucasjiang]

Hi all, i am thinking about keeping freshwater crabs that can also breed in freshwater. can kind bros here provide information? thanks!

• geosesarma notophorum (mandarin crab)
• vampire crab
• thaipusa sirikit - can this breed in freshwater?
• metasesarma obesum - this appears to be a brackish species. has anyone kept this before?
• heterothelphusa fatum - very common, but not much breeding info on this species.

(Edit: lucas, the sighting requests should be in the LFS Sighting sub-forum, so they have been consolidated into this post, http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum...ad.php?t=48106)

[Quixotic]

G. notophorum (mandarin crab) and G. sp. "vampire" (vampire/carnaval crabs) have similar requirements. They are semi-terrestrial crabs, so setup should consist of primarily terrestrial area (1/3 water, 2/3 land). Just ensure that they are able to climb out of water easily, otherwise, they may drown. Provide plenty of cover on land, so that they have many hiding places. My own experience is that they don't really like to get wet at all.

From information that I have read, water parameters aren't exactly important and not required for reproduction, it can be fresh or brackish water, low or high pH. Female crabs will carry fertilised eggs under their carapace (reported to be between 20 to 80 but I think 80 is a very optimistic estimate) where they will develop until the offsprings hatch. Newly hatched offsprings will ride on top the carapace of their mother until they are independent on their own (can't remember the exact details and for how long).

Haven't read enough of the rest to comment.

[BEASTIEPENDENT]

Hello ;-)

Hi all, i am thinking about keeping freshwater crabs that can also breed in freshwater.
thaipusa sirikit - can this breed in freshwater?

Yes, definitely. Although the ones we kept didn't do, sadly.

metasesarma obesum - this appears to be a brackish species. has anyone kept this before?

They live on beaches of islands where no fresh water exists. So they should be kept with marine or brackish water – but they need a terrarium with only a little part (or dish) of water. They reproduce as non-abbreviated type, that means with marine zoea.

[*]heterothelphusa fatum - very common, but not much breeding info on this species.

This is another true freshwater crab. We kept some but they were imported very poorly and died soon – and it was only males. If they are given good conditions they should reproduce without "help". ;-)

[lucasjiang]

thanks for all the help. just gotten some geosesarma notophorum

[Quixotic]

Thanks Ollie (aka BEASTIEPENDENT) for dropping in and share the information with us.

[lucasjiang]

thanks ollie, your website is very informative and has a lot of info on freshwater crabs. in fact, i learnt about mandarin crabs on your webaite. thank you !

[BEASTIEPENDENT]

Thank You very much for Youre praise, You two, You're welcome. ;-) It's our goal to hep these beautiful and fascinating animals and so of course the keepers.

And since many of the interesting crab species – especially fresh water – live in SEA it seemed adaeqaute to "drop by". ;-) Hopefully we can expand information on english but since we don't have any time this year (stressing job and other problems) that is not a priority in the moment. If there raise questions we wll help though if we can.