Mr. Crabs Changes Shells...AGAIN!

 Mrs. Derringer was cleaning up the crabitat after school on Wednesday in preparation for the end of the year...when she moved the shells and went to pull Mr. Crabs out, "Gasp!" His shell was empty!

There were two very similar shells in the crabitat: the one Mr. Crabs had previously inhabited took on an orange-tinted color after we had the orange hermit crab sand a couple months back. The orange-tinted shell sat empty, with just a bit of water inside!

Mr. Crabs was found burrowed deep down in the sand...in the OTHER shell that was almost just like the one he had before! The shells even have the same little shiny spot on the side. They can be told apart by the color of the shell itself: the old one has the orange tint, and the new one looks cleaner and has a greenish tint.

We still haven't found a molted exoskeleton in the crabitat, but if you look very closely at Mr. Crabs' second pair of legs, you can see prominent hairs. According to our research materials, this is a sign of a freshly molted crab! We assume he probably molted and ate his exoskeleton...yum!

Mr. Crabs got a special salt water bath as a house-warming present!  :)