what is going on???

Question
This may be one for the books. Here goes...my son has two hermit crabs acquired from school. A week ago, Lefty buried himself while Eugene was going on his daily business. Last night we came home to find Lefty's empty shell but later noticed Lefty inside a much too large shell for him (he could hide all the way inside and not be noticed.) This morning, we noticed there were some shells rearranged and what looked like a naked Lefty buried in the sand (I assumed he left the much too large shell.) I went to check on Eugene and he is now where in sight! And then I see that Lefty is still in the large shell... so who is buried naked in the sand? If it was Eugene, then where is his shell? I go to isolate Lefty and his big shell (so Eugene could be safe), only to find a sand cavern under the shell with "something" in it (exoskeleton? Lefty's?) Is the naked buried think an exoskeleton. I'm so freaked out, and really don't want to touch or move anything around. I'm hoping that all of this resolves itself out without my intervention. Please advise. Thanks for your help.

Answer
Hi,
thank you for your question.
Crabs often bury shells. It's possible that Eugene buried himself and left his shell after the molt or that Lefty buried Eugenes shell. But it's also possible that the thing you saw buried in the sand is just Eugenes exoskeleton and he moved for some reason, still in his shell. They should be fine together, cannibalism only occurs when the crabs are lacking animal protein in their diet or when the tank is too small for the crabs to find a place to molt. Leave the alone as much as possible, keep the humidity high and offer food high in protein, chitin and calcium, like krill, shrimps, brine shrimp, dead crickets/mealworms or mushrooms.

If you saw just the exo under the sand, your crabs will be fine. If it's Eugene without his shell, he might be sick, a crab that leaves its shell usually has some sort of problem. But unfortunately, there's nothing you can do, they have to pull through by themselves.
You can find a lot more info on crab care on these websites:
www.thecrabbagepatch.com
www.hermitcrabassociation.com
www.landhermitcrabs.com
www.crabstreetjournal.com
www.epicurean-hermit.com
www.hermit-crabs.com
http://www.crabbytalk.com/

I hope I was of some help to you
Jennifer