Do crabs molt their shell?

Do crabs molt (shed) their shell like a shrimp would?

 

Yup

 

I have a unknown crab in my tank for at least six month's if not a year since I set up. I cought the first two but this one is smarter than the rest. any way it molted last month and the next time I saw him he was at least a third bigger!
Maybe I should start trying to catch him again.
Darren

 

When crabs molt does the entire body molt (including legs and pinchers) ?

This is what I found lying on my sand. I took it to my LFS. I was told it was a dead "Black Emerald crab" and it was not a good guy.

This is what I found:





...the belly side:




This morning I discovered an exact duplicate of what I show on the top pics moving about beneath a rock and he seemed bigger. So either the crab molted, or this is hitchhiker #2.

Was the guy at the LFS correct?

If not, what kind of crab is this?

 

dos it have red eyes

 

Crabs do indeed molt their legs an pincers. I don't know if the guy at the lfs was right or not but I'd be getting that crab out of the tank asap.

 

when my crab molted the different parts of the shell and legs where appart. it does look like a dead crab you could open the shell see if there is any meat? Its a Mithrax crab for sure just not sure about the emerald part though. I have never heard of a black emerald. Emeralds are usually green (the color of emerald), your's seem brownish. On the belly side up picture you can see colored spots on his stomach, emeralds have a uniform coloring on there belly. Check the joints on its pinchers, if you see some red in there its an emerald.

 

Funny I just went through the same thing with my Mithrax crab sssnake. I saw the shell out in front of the tank and thought it was a goner, then a couple nights later I saw a much bigger Emerald crab running around in my tank. Man it's shiny now too.

 

Yep. pom pom molted once already. Another unknown species of crab molted as well.