Keeping aquatic animals is all about experience, knowing what to do and what could live with what, etc. I and many other experienced aquarists do advise keeping animals of the same species and type together, but in most cases, it doesn’t work like that, especially if the animals involved are aggressive and territorial. Red Claw crabs and fiddler crabs are both crustaceans and in the same crab family, both of them share. many things in common. Then here is, can they live together?
Can Fiddler crab and Red Claw crab live together? Red claw crab and Fiddler crab cannot live together. Red Claw crab is very aggressive and will kill Fiddler crab if they are kept together.
When thinking of keeping different aquatic animals together, including animals of the same species and type, the first and the most important thing is to evaluate their temperaments.
Temperament is the most important thing to check, then other things like type of water, temperature, etc.
Red Claw Crab Temperament
Red Claw Crabs are very aggressive and territorial.
They will attack anything in their tank including their kind.
This is seen more in male Red Claw crabs, that’s why it’s very advisable not to keep more males than females, as the males will attack each other and any other tank mates they might have.
Apart from being aggressive, they are scavengers too, meaning they are ready to kill and eat anything they could be able to kill.
Fiddler Crab Temperament
On the other hand, Fiddler crabs are peaceful crabs and the males are semi-aggressive.
Just like the red claw crab, they too are territorial and are scavengers too, but they don’t behave like the red claw crabs when it comes to hunting because they are less aggressive compared to red Claw crabs.
Red Claw Crab and Fiddler Crab Water Parameters
When it comes to water parameters, the two different crabs have almost everything in common.
Water Parameters for Red Claw crabs are:
Water temperature: 70°F to 88°F (your target should be the middle of this range)
pH levels: 7.5 to 8.5.
Water hardness: 8 to 25 dGH.
Specific gravity: 1.005
°Water type: Both freshwater and brackish water.
Water Parameters for Fiddler crabs are:
°Temperature: 75-85°F
°Ph: 8.0-8.3
°Water hardness: 15kh
°Water type: Brackish water.
Can Red Claw Crabs and Fiddler Crabs Share a Tank?
Red Claw crabs are very aggressive and will kill Fiddler crabs if they stay together in a tank.
It is very obvious that both of them can’t make a great tank mate and a good team in their tank.
Looking at these features, you could easily tell that they have almost the same features except their temperaments, and so could survive where one survives.
This is to say that fiddler crabs being Brackish water dwellers could easily dwell in water where red claw crabs could comfortably live in.
Both being able to tolerate Brackish water makes them potential good tank mates, but what makes them unsuitable for each other is their behaviors.
The fact that no two aggressive or semi-aggressive animals could be able to coexist peacefully disqualifies both the red claw crabs and fiddler crabs from sharing a tank or they will harm each other or even their offspring.
Can Female Red Claw Crabs and Female Fiddler Crabs Live Together?
We all know that the most aggressive of any animal is the males, so can female red claw crabs and the female fiddler crabs live together?
Yes, female red claw crab and female fiddler crab are less aggressive and will tolerate each other in a tank if there is enough space for them.
They can only be able to coexist in a tank if the tank is very large so, that they could stay out of each other ways and mind their business.
Again if the tank is planted and has many caves, gravel, and sand, islands where they will stay to avoid each other troubles, etc.
Although both crabs could eat live plants, red claw crabs are pigs when it comes to eating plants so, they will eat any live plant they might have in their tank.
But all the same, they still need a live plant to be Happy.
So, keeping all these things in a large tank will give them a chance to live together and achieve at least 90% of peace.
Don’t get me wrong, sometimes behaviors could change and in many circumstances, I have experienced it.
What am trying to say is, that their level of peaceful coexistence is not guaranteed to be high, but with good care, you might achieve a lot of peace while keeping female fiddlers and female red claws.
But despite all, they have much more chance of coexistence than their male counterparts.
Conclusion
Both red claw crabs and fiddler crabs are almost the same, but they can’t live together or one must have to die, so don’t keep them together despite anything you might hear from pet stores of ordinary individuals.
