Image courtesy - the Spruce Pets
With its soft body, a hermit crab needs shelter, and it finds it in the shell of another animal.
Instead of hiding in, say, rock or coral, it slips into an abandoned whelk, winkle, or other similar shell. Unlike true crabs, the hermit's abdomen curls to one side to fit the spirals of gastropod shells. Once the creature is safely inside a shell, it seals the entrance with its claw. Some species of hermit crab will coax a sea anemone onto their shell to keep predators at bay. P As the crab grows and the fit gets tighter, it must move house. When it
finds another empty shell of about the right size, the crab surveys it with great care. It holds the shell with its front walking legs, climbs on it, and rolls it over, running it's opened claws across the surface to check its texture and shape. Then the crab removes any debris with its claws. The next step is to see how the shell fits. The crab flexes its abdomen and reverses into the shell, going in and out several times to see how the new accommodation feels from the inside.If it is snug, the crab will move in, but
It will not always leave straightaway. If the old shell had an anemone, the crab taps and massages it until it releases its grip. Once the anemone is safely stuck to its new roof, the move is complete.
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