Keeping Yabbies as pets is surprisingly easy, so long as you remember the following:
- Keep the water well filtered and aerated, a good pump\filter will do the job, you’ll need to clean your filter at the very least once a week, Yabbies are dirty buggers
- Feed them well, otherwise when you DO feed them, fights will happen
- Give them plenty of places to hide\live, double the places for the number of Yabbies you have, they molt and have soft shells for a time, so will need to hide. PVC tubing cut into lengths and tied together into a pyramid pattern is ideal
- If you have males and females together and one of the females does get berried (eggs) separate her out into another tank, otherwise when your babies hatch, the others including Mum, WILL eat them
- You do not need to keep things warm for your Yabbies, if your tank is inside then the temperature you keep your house will more than suffice, there is some conjecture on if Yabbies will breed in cooler weather, it seems like they will
- What food? Normal fish flakes are fine, they also love vegies, peas, carrot, any greens. Make sure to remove any uneaten food, otherwise it will spoil and cause your water to become murky. When they molt, they will also eat their shed shells, as a good source of calcium
- Cover your tank, even though you think the water level is well below the top of your tank, Yabbies are great climbers, silicon and cords are easy work for them. I’ve been woken in the middle of the night by one of my cats using a Yabby as a play toy, cover the top of your tank, flywire is perfect.
Please be sure to leave a comment if you have any more tips that I have forgotten here.