Electric Blue Hermit

[Timfish]

Got a great video of an Electric Blue Hermit, Carcinus elegans, feeding off red and green algae in one of my systems. Love these hermits! They're great algae eaters, scraping alga and cyano off rocks and they have great colors. The genus Carcinus has some other colorful hermits, notably the Orange Knee, C. pictus, hails from Hawai'i. Interestingly, the females care for the larva, keeping them in the shell until the young have matured to the point they can inhabit a shell of their own.

 

[Dread Pirate Dave]

I need to add some more hermits. Maybe one of these guys too!

 

[Subsea]

Nice video.

I was curious as to the difference between Electric Blue & Blue Leg hermits crabs:

Scientific Name & Species: The Electric Blue Hermit Crab is Calcinus elegans (also called the Blue Knuckle or Blue Banded hermit crab). Common Blue Leg Hermit Crabs (often dwarf varieties) usually belong to a different species (Clibanarius tricolor). [1, 2, 3]

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

I wish these guys were more plentiful in the hobby, they're great little clean up crew members and look amazing!

 

[helmsreef]

I have one in my system that is about 4 years old and uses a golf ball sized turbo snail shell. Probably the coolest clean up crew member I have and built like a tank.

 

[saltwaterfish.com Verified Sponsor]

Beautiful video, I use to have one in my 75 but he got banished to my sump where he lives as a king with a couple old tomato clowns. I would love to have more in my reef system but I have too many small corals in my sand bed that they like to mess with.

 

[davidm777]

My experience was the same. Dude got big! I got a little Acantho and fed it. The crab damaged the corals mouth getting to the food... I haven't emotionally recovered from that experience.