Do you
remember running down to the seashore in the golden June sunshine to hunt out
purple stars, watch little jet-streams spurt of out of clam beds and flip over
a few rocks, just to watch the wee crabs skitter for dear life? Yes, those were
the wonderful days to remember. The days when, for two beautiful, heavenly
months, responsibility and care were forgone for so many carefree hours of
nothing but exploring Mother Nature’s wonders.
Little
did we realize that what we were seeing was a mere sampling of what nature has
to offer.
Take,
for example, those skittering little crabs. The ones we used to find along the
shore, back then, were fascinating little creatures. They came in all sizes. We
once saw one no bigger than the eraser on a pencil, but most of them were
around the size of a quarter. We thought these were pretty big guys, although,
when the water was clear we could see that there were even larger crabs living
in the deep. Those guys, about the size of our half-grown feet, never seemed to
come into the shallows where we could reach them. And that was fine by us, of
course, as we had ourselves convinced that they had pinchers big enough to nip
our toes off! Must be the biggest, most amazing crabs on earth, we figured.
But
Mother Nature had not yet begun to speak.
The
great, vast ocean is just crawling with members of the crab family, and they
come in a surprising variety of colors, shapes, and sizes. We had no idea!
Here
are a few.
Coconut Crab:
This is guy is the world’s
largest land grab with a leg span of around three feet and top weight of around
9lbs. It gets its name from its ability to crack open coconuts to eat the meat
inside. That’s a pretty strong set of pinchers! Fortunately there’s a pretty
good supply of coconuts in their native Pacific Island homes. You should check
out this picture of one clinging to a garbage can. If he wanted to, he could
climb into that can and use it as a nicely sized shell!
Tasmanian Giant Crab:
This
crab can be up to a very impressive 29lbs! They are quite impressive to see,
needless to say, but the male is liable to get more of your attention. He
develops one claw which is in scale with the size of his body. The other one is
two or three times that big! It would be like having a right arm the size of
your leg. He can use this to pinch open the mollusks that he eats. These deep
water Australian natives can only mate during that brief period after they’ve
shed their old shell and put on a new one, before the new hardens too much.
This may happen as infrequently as every 9 years. It’s no wonder the female
lays as many as 2 million eggs at a shot! She may not have another chance for a
while.
Japanese Spider Crab:
If you
think you’ve been impressed so far, you have not yet begun to gasp. The
Japanese Spider Crab is the biggest crab in the world. It can have an arm span
as wide as 12 feet. That’s just about as long as the average living room! Huge!
It’s amazing to realize that these hulking guys actually start out as small,
round, transparent, legless little plankton-like blobs. Mind you, so do we. But
in spite of their massive size, these guys still manage to hide away. They
vaguely resemble the sea floor in color and texture to begin with. Then they
stick sponges and kelp to themselves so they blend in even more. By the way,
did I mention? They also may live to be as old as 100 years! What an amazing
creature.
Yeti Crab
This
guy isn’t so big, but he is an unusual looking crab. He is actually a furry
crab! His long, yellow, fuzzy arms kind of look like feathers. This South
Pacific deep water crab brushes his hairy chest very carefully every day. It’s
not vanity. He catches his food in his hair and combs it out at dinner time.
Shame-Faced Crab
This
little fellow gets his startling name from his habit of wrapping his claws
around his face as though we were embarrassed by something,
Rainbow Swimming Crab
This
creature could just as easily have been named “Psychedelic Crab”. Their
beautiful shell displays every color of the rainbow and then some.
Vampire Crab
Aptly
named and a wee bit spooky. This black crab, upon reaching adulthood, develops
bright red eyes. Yikes!
Candy Crab
This crab, no doubt, gets
his name from his appearance. He’s all pink and gooey looking like he just might
melt. But don’t eat him too quick or you might get a mouthful of something you
weren’t expecting. He has this habit of grabbing bits of coral and sticking
them to his back.
I could
keep crabbing at you for hours. Did you know there are something like 5000
species scuttling around out there? And some of them have some really
interesting names, like Clown Crab, Raspberry Crab, Electric Leg Hermit Crab, Emerald Crab, Teddy Bear Crab, Nimble Spray, Pom Pom Boxer, and Sally Lightfoot Crab. And the more you look, the more you find one is more fascinating than the last.
So,
make sure to spend some time with Mother Nature, this summer. You can never
tell what she may have tucked under a rock somewhere.
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