Our hermies had their first big vacation adventure on Spring Break! They rode away from the school in style on Saturday in the front seat of Mrs. D.'s car.
When they arrived at their vacation destination, Mrs. D.'s house, they got to hang out in a cool green tub while their crabitat was cleaned and freshened up a bit by the housekeeping staff (Mrs. D.).
The hang out featured a super cool Lego climber, which each of the crabs hesitantly explored. Ranger was brave enough to climb up onto the little Lego staircase, but he climbed right back off again.
Perhaps we need to persuade them that Legos are amazing...the Derringer crew has big plans for building a Lego hideaway in the not-too-distant-future...
Our hermies settled into their new crabby condominium: Mrs. D.'s bakers rack! The bakers rack is located right between the kitchen and the dining area, and this is where Mrs. D. keeps all of her Bibles, small group study materials, devotionals, and Bible study materials...along with some of her crafting supplies! What a WONDERFUL place to spend a vacation: surrounded by scripture, sewing supplies, and hot glue guns! Ahhhh! The bakers rack truly made a perfect vacation hotspot for the hermit crabs for three reasons:
- Safety: The crabitat could be safely tucked away from the cats, and, let's face it...from Henry too. Nobody wants to spend their vacation getting batted around by curious cats or poked and prodded by over-excited toddlers- hermit crabs included!
- Temperature: Since hermit crabs prefer to relax in the 70-80 degree range, the bakers rack is close enough to the warm kitchen, yet far enough away from the drafty patio door to keep them nice and cozy.
- Social Scene: Their spot on the bakers rack is at eye-level for the Derringer kids, and the family passes by this location often. This will help the crabs learn to live with activity, since the classroom environment is always bustling!
The crabitat was refreshed with several new empty shells of varying sizes. The new, bright blue crawling branch that was donated was repositioned, and the food bowl was relocated. Hermit crabs LOVE companionship and variety: since their native habitat is the beach, they are accustomed to living in groups and scavenging for food and interesting things to do. As we learned from our new nonfiction read-aloud,
Hermit Crabs as Pets by Charles Sure, "The fastest way to have an unhappy, unhealthy hermit crab is to ask him to be a hermit! Hermies do not like to live alone and they absolutely have to have intellectual stimulation" (p. 14-15).
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