diff --git a/zebra-network/src/config.rs b/zebra-network/src/config.rs
index 6a4f3e4885f..3c40801b2b3 100644
--- a/zebra-network/src/config.rs
+++ b/zebra-network/src/config.rs
@@ -67,6 +67,11 @@ impl Config {
     async fn resolve_peers(peers: &HashSet<String>) -> HashSet<SocketAddr> {
         use futures::stream::StreamExt;
 
+        if peers.is_empty() {
+            error!("no initial peers in the network config. Hint: you must configure at least one peer or DNS seeder to run Zebra");
+            return HashSet::new();
+        }
+
         loop {
             // We retry each peer individually, as well as retrying if there are
             // no peers in the combined list. DNS failures are correlated, so all
diff --git a/zebra-network/src/peer_set/candidate_set.rs b/zebra-network/src/peer_set/candidate_set.rs
index d296747bdf5..831d4f0f0e4 100644
--- a/zebra-network/src/peer_set/candidate_set.rs
+++ b/zebra-network/src/peer_set/candidate_set.rs
@@ -131,7 +131,15 @@ where
         }
     }
 
-    /// Update the peer set from the network.
+    /// Update the peer set from the network, using the default fanout limit.
+    ///
+    /// See `update_initial` for details.
+    pub async fn update(&mut self) -> Result<(), BoxError> {
+        self.update_inner(None).await
+    }
+
+    /// Update the peer set from the network, limiting the fanout to
+    /// `fanout_limit`.
     ///
     /// - Ask a few live `Responded` peers to send us more peers.
     /// - Process all completed peer responses, adding new peers in the
@@ -139,6 +147,9 @@ where
     ///
     /// ## Correctness
     ///
+    /// Pass the initial peer set size as `fanout_limit` during initialization,
+    /// so that Zebra does not send duplicate requests to the same peer.
+    ///
     /// The crawler exits when update returns an error, so it must only return
     /// errors on permanent failures.
     ///
@@ -148,7 +159,15 @@ where
     /// `report_failed` puts peers into the `Failed` state.
     ///
     /// `next` puts peers into the `AttemptPending` state.
-    pub async fn update(&mut self) -> Result<(), BoxError> {
+    pub async fn update_initial(&mut self, fanout_limit: usize) -> Result<(), BoxError> {
+        self.update_inner(Some(fanout_limit)).await
+    }
+
+    /// Update the peer set from the network, limiting the fanout to
+    /// `fanout_limit`.
+    ///
+    /// See `update_initial` for details.
+    async fn update_inner(&mut self, fanout_limit: Option<usize>) -> Result<(), BoxError> {
         // Opportunistically crawl the network on every update call to ensure
         // we're actively fetching peers. Continue independently of whether we
         // actually receive any peers, but always ask the network for more.
@@ -159,7 +178,7 @@ where
         // called while the peer set is already loaded.
         let mut responses = FuturesUnordered::new();
         trace!("sending GetPeers requests");
-        for _ in 0..constants::GET_ADDR_FANOUT {
+        for _ in 0..fanout_limit.unwrap_or(constants::GET_ADDR_FANOUT) {
             // CORRECTNESS
             //
             // Use a timeout to avoid deadlocks when there are no connected
diff --git a/zebra-network/src/peer_set/initialize.rs b/zebra-network/src/peer_set/initialize.rs
index 44abfff2dab..f5c0c7484a6 100644
--- a/zebra-network/src/peer_set/initialize.rs
+++ b/zebra-network/src/peer_set/initialize.rs
@@ -140,12 +140,14 @@ where
     );
 
     // 2. Initial peers, specified in the config.
+    let (initial_peer_count_tx, initial_peer_count_rx) = tokio::sync::oneshot::channel();
     let initial_peers_fut = {
         let config = config.clone();
         let connector = connector.clone();
         let peerset_tx = peerset_tx.clone();
         async move {
             let initial_peers = config.initial_peers().await;
+            let _ = initial_peer_count_tx.send(initial_peers.len());
             // Connect the tx end to the 3 peer sources:
             add_initial_peers(initial_peers, connector, peerset_tx).await
         }
@@ -160,10 +162,11 @@ where
     // We need to await candidates.update() here, because zcashd only sends one
     // `addr` message per connection, and if we only have one initial peer we
     // need to ensure that its `addr` message is used by the crawler.
-    // XXX this should go in CandidateSet::new, but we need init() -> Result<_,_>
 
     info!("Sending initial request for peers");
-    let _ = candidates.update().await;
+    let _ = candidates
+        .update_initial(initial_peer_count_rx.await.expect("value sent before drop"))
+        .await;
 
     for _ in 0..config.peerset_initial_target_size {
         let _ = demand_tx.try_send(());