"Back in my day..."

This weekend, while the kids were all gone for the long weekend, I spent getting ready to release Pixel from his temporary shelter in the terrarium inside the actual aquarium.

I got a 29 gallon aquarium from a co-worker and filled that up with water and salt on Saturday afternoon. I put a couple of powerheads (submersible water pumps) in the tank and left.

It is now Monday night and I am still waiting for all of the salt to dissolve. This tank will be used as a tank to store food until I feed it to Pixel. Right now he is eating red-legged hermit crabs. These hermit crabs are bigger than the more common blue-legged hermit crabs.

Unfortunately, one of the first things the 50 red-legged hermit crabs did was to kill one of my two Sally Lightfoot crabs I had in the tank. I had noticed that this crab was a little weak, but I was still more than a little pissed off. Any regrets about feeding the hermit crabs to Pixel was gone at that moment.

A few days later, I feared that the hermit crabs had killed the other Sally Lightfoot. As it turns out, though, that crab had molted (discarded its outer shell in order to grow, much like a snake shedding skin). So now I have a perfect crab shell.

It looks like Lefty and Righty will be going back to the pet store. I thought about moving one of the fish into the feeder tank, but a 29 gallon tank is simply not large enough for Sergeant Majors. I think leaving them as food for Pixel is not very humane, either.

I also spent a little time doing some last minute escape-proofing to the tank. I installed velcro strips along the top rim of the tank. Velcro loops, like astroturf, does not feel good to octopuses, and will keep Pixel from throwing his legs over the side of the tank and making a jump.

I am going to borrow a digital cam-corder from our A/V department later on this week, so hopefully I will have some decent movies of Pixel moving about. I am slowly starting to figure out his "moods". He is playful at times, just moving around and having fun. Other times he is hunting. Most of the time, though, he is eating.