What is the largest crab in the world? The largest crabs in the world Land crab on fruit trees.
- Class: Crustacea = Crustaceans, crayfish
- Subclass: Malacostraca = Higher crayfish
- Order Decapoda = Decapod crustaceans (crayfish, crabs...)
- Suborder: Pleocyemata Burkenroad, 1963 = Crabs
- Infraorder: Brachyura Latreille, 1802 = Crabs, short-tailed crayfish
Land (land) crabs
Crabs are Marine life, and it is difficult to imagine that they can live on land, and even more so in trees or in arid regions. Therefore, land-based land crabs are an unusual zoological phenomenon.
The conquest of land by crabs was gradual. Crabs had 10 times less time to conquer land than insects, but their success in adapting to terrestrial existence is very significant. The initial stage of this process is the development of ghost crabs and soldier crabs on tropical beaches. These crabs live in burrows in coastal areas regularly flooded by ocean tides.
Mangrove crabs living on the roots and branches of mangrove trees in tropical rainforests have taken the next step towards land development. All these crabs migrate to the sea for breeding, and after breeding is completed, they again leave for many kilometers from the coast.
Another way for crabs to explore the continents is their adaptation to life in fresh water (see). Along the rivers and streams, these crabs penetrated far into the depths of the continents, climbed the mountains, mastering even the Himalayas. Some crabs, such as the bromeliad crab Metopaulias depressus, have adapted to live in the axils of large leaves. land plants where rain water accumulates.
Tropical earth crabs spend their whole lives on land, living in bare desert areas where huge cacti proudly rise above the sands. These crabs can be found at a distance of several kilometers from the sea, where in search of food they roam the clearings overgrown with thorny bushes and barren savannahs. These crabs feed on leaves and other greens.
In the deserts of Australia, thousands of kilometers from the sea, a crab lives, which uses night dew and carries juveniles in a tightly closed “pocket” on its abdomen. The main problem for land crabs is the fight against desiccation. They solve this problem in several ways. Firstly, dense calcareous covers of the body prevent drying, and secondly, crabs go hunting only at night or after heavy tropical rains, in dry time hiding in underground burrows. In addition, real gills in earth crabs are transformed into a "lung", the respiratory surface of which is moistened due to the presence of tufts of bristles that suck water from the sand. Crab burrows, dug in soft ground, form complex labyrinths several meters long. Often one of the exits leads to a reservoir, due to which high humidity is maintained in the crab's cave.
An extremely unusual respiratory organ was formed in land crabs skopimera and dotilla. These crabs live at the very edge of the water, gathering food on the bare seabed at low tide, and hiding in deep burrows where air is stored at high tide. They breathe with their feet. The hips of the walking legs of these crabs are greatly expanded, and in their middle there is a “window” covered with a thin membrane. In scopimera, windows, the width of the entire segment, are located even on the front claws. In dotilla, they are smaller, but they are also located on the sides of the shell. Previously, it was assumed that these windows serve as organs of hearing, but it turned out that these are real respiratory organs. Crabs with windows smeared with paint begin to suffocate and try with all their might to peel off the paint. Directly under the membrane, inside the segment, there is a complex system of tubules filled with blood. The venous blood passing through them comes into contact with the "gas window" and is enriched with oxygen. The total gas exchange surface of these crabs is large - up to square millimeters, that is, more than that of terrestrial crabs that breathe with their lungs.
Ghost crabs lead night image life. During the day, they escape from overheating and drying out in deep burrows (up to 1.8 meters deep in large individuals) with a closing entrance. They feed on living crustaceans, mollusks, plant foods (even seeds), and decaying remains. On land, ghost crabs move in sharp dashes at speeds up to 1.8 meters per second on sand and up to 2.3 meters per second on solid ground. Crabs do not avoid humans and even concentrate in places where they find the remains of his food (near baths, beach cafes, etc.).
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No doubt you can! Crabs living on the shore near the water are quite unpretentious and easy to care for. Therefore, certain types of these invertebrates can be kept as pets. They are fun to watch and don't need expensive equipment.
Land crabs cannot be kept in a fish tank, but they are fairly easy to care for and the time you spend caring for a crab is comparable to maintaining a regular water tank.
What types of land crabs can be started at home?
The most popular pets are rainbow crabs and harlequin crabs. Both of these species are quite unpretentious, have a modest size and live mainly on land. However, like all other species, they need access to water, so a crab tank needs to have both a water zone and land.
The color of the rainbow crab, as you can easily guess from the name, combines shades of purple, blue, orange and cream. The body of the harlequin crab is usually black, and the legs are orange, with purple markings on the claws. Representatives of both species are colored very brightly and look beautiful!
Housing for land crabs 
Land crabs do not need huge aquariums. These are territorial animals, which in nature usually limit their movements to a certain area. It is better to keep land crabs in pairs; if you are planning to keep a group, the aquarium must be very spacious, otherwise your pets may start fighting for territory. For two crabs, an aquarium measuring 60x30x30 cm will suffice.
In an aquarium with crabs, there should be both water and land. It is best to form a "shore" of special sand for reptiles near one of the walls of the aquarium. The depth of the water should be about 7-9 cm. Crabs will burrow in the sand, so it is very important to use sand that will hold its shape when wet and will not fall into these burrows. Over time, part of the coast is gradually washed away, therefore, in order to maintain its shape, you can create “dams” from snags or aquarium decor items.
Even if the water zone in the aquarium is relatively small and shallow, a small aquarium filter is still necessary: it will keep the water clean.
Crabs love to eat fish, so do not populate aquarium fish in the water zone of the aquarium!
Temperature and conditions of detention
The sand in the crab aquarium should always be wet; most often this happens due to constant contact with water. If you notice that the sand is dry, the air in the tank may be too dry, or the volume of water may not be large enough.
Both rainbow crabs and harlequin crabs live near fresh water. Ordinary tap water can be used, but special dechlorinators must be added to it, or allowed to stand before being poured into the aquarium.
In the wild, crabs usually live in warm climates, so you'll need a heating mat and a thermometer to keep an eye on the temperature in your tank. The mat should be placed under the part of the aquarium filled with water. The thermostat must be set to 22 degrees.
What do land crabs eat?
They are omnivores. In nature, crabs feed on plants, fish, and whatever else they can find. Special food for hermit crabs is also suitable for land crabs. You can also feed them raw fish, small cubes of frozen food intended for aquarium fish, potatoes, apples. In addition, your pet will need special calcium supplements for growth and a healthy shell.
Where to buy crabs
Land crabs are sold at some exotic pet stores. But it is better to purchase them from private breeders who can advise you on everything related to crab care.
Crabs are a large group of aquatic and semi-aquatic animals belonging to the order Decapod Crustaceans. Crabs differ from their related crayfish, shrimp, lobsters and spiny lobsters in their noticeably shortened abdomen, tucked under a wide cephalothorax. This gives them a specific, well-recognized form. At the same time, crabs have reached an unprecedented diversity: 6793 species of these animals are united in 93 families, which is half the number of the entire detachment.
Spotted rock crab (Grapsus grapsus) is an inhabitant of the Galapagos Islands.
Along with a special body shape, crabs are characterized by the presence of 10 pairs of limbs. They are divided into chest and abdominal. The first 3 pairs of thoracic limbs are very short, they are called mandibles, because they do not participate in movement, but serve only to bring food to the mouth. The remaining pairs of pectoral legs serve to move, capture and cut food, and can also perform other auxiliary functions. The pair of largest and most massive legs are pincers. With their help, crabs can not only hunt, but also defend themselves, participate in mating battles. The narrow specialization of these organs is reflected in their appearance: often the right and left claws have different sizes and shapes, giving the crab body a noticeable asymmetry. As for the ventral legs, they are small and are used for fertilization (in males) or gestation (in females). Such vital organs as gills are connected with the pectoral legs of crabs. Often their petals are located directly on the segments of the legs or near the place of their attachment to the body.
Because of the huge difference in claw size, fiddler crabs appear to be one-armed. Like people, these animals are right-handed and left-handed, with right-handers making up 85%.
Crabs are one of the most perfect crustaceans, so they have developed sensory organs. Vision plays an important role in their lives. The eyes of these animals are complex, faceted. They consist of thousands of eyes, each of which sees only a tiny part of the space directly in front of it. The final assembly of the image takes place already in the brain of the animal. Numerous observations have shown that with the help of vision, crabs identify a potential enemy, find a partner during the breeding season, and navigate in search of food. But if the animal is blinded, it will only lose the ability to see danger, and find food and a partner with almost the same efficiency. In this he will be helped by antennas ("antennae") that can capture odors. If the crab also cut off the antennae, then it ... will find food again. True, in this case, he will have to spend a lot of time and effort, because he will literally move towards the prey by touch, tapping his claws on the ground. Some types of crabs have balance organs - statoliths. By the way, the eye stalks play a huge role in their physiology. These are real endocrine glands, capable of secreting hormones and regulating body functions such as the frequency of molts, the onset of puberty, and even color change!
The terrestrial bigeye Latreille (Macrophthalmus latreillei) has especially long eye stalks, which is associated with the need to inspect the area at a great distance.
Crabs do not have skin as such; it is replaced by a layer of hard and impenetrable chitin, which forms a kind of shell. Chitin is not able to stretch, which makes normal linear growth impossible. Crabs solve this problem with regular moults. When the old shell bursts, a soft and defenseless animal is selected from it. It takes from several weeks to six months to harden the new cover, during this period the crab hides in a secluded place and grows intensively. Chitin can be impregnated with all sorts of pigments, so the color of crabs can be almost any.
The Bicolor Vampire Crab (Geosesarma bicolor) gets its name from its unusual combination of bright yellow eyes with a deep purple shell. Due to its imposing appearance, it is often kept by amateur aquarists.
In addition, the chitinous cover may have outgrowths: rare and hard, like thorns, short and hard, like bristles, or long and thin, like wool.
Chinese mitten crab (Eriocheir sinensis) stands out among relatives with a "fur" muff on claws.
The sizes of these animals also vary widely. The diameter of the shell of the smallest pea crab in the world does not exceed 1 cm, while the leg span of the largest Japanese spider crab reaches 4 m with a weight of 20 kg.
Pea crab (Pinnotheres boninensis) lives on the coast of the Azov and Black Seas.
Crabs inhabit all the seas and oceans of the planet, but they reach the greatest diversity in the tropics. The habitat of these crustaceans has a very wide range: crabs can be found in the shallow waters of the seas and oceans, among coral thickets on reefs, at depths of up to 5000 m, in cave reservoirs, in the tidal zone, mangroves and even in the depths of islands away from the coast. The vast majority of them live in salt water, about 850 species live in fresh water. Crabs that spend a long time on land store water under their shells or develop lungs-like organs. Their underdeveloped gills almost do not work, and with constant immersion in water, such individuals die. Bottom-dwelling species are often active in the dark; land crabs are most active during the day.
The second largest Tasmanian on the planet giant crab(Pseudocarcinus gigas) with a shell width of 46 cm weighs up to 13 kg.
When moving, these crustaceans never put both legs of one pair on the ground at the same time, which gives their gait stability, but the short body length and a large number of legs make it uncomfortable to move forward, so crabs prefer to walk sideways. At the same time, this does not in the least prevent them from developing a decent speed, for example, a grass crab overcomes 1 m in 1 s! But these animals swim poorly and reluctantly.
The exception is swimming crabs, in which the back pair of legs is transformed into oar blades, thanks to which they feel at home in the water element.
The nature of these crustaceans is quarrelsome, they all live alone and jealously guard their sites or shelters; males are especially aggressive. At the same time, the areas of small crabs are very small, so there can be up to 50 of their minks per 1 sq.m. Danger is the only thing that makes the inhabitants of the colony forget about strife. In the event of a threat, crabs signal their neighbors by waving their claws, making sounds, or tapping on the ground. Thanks to vibrations, even those individuals who do not see the enemy have time to hide.
Blue soldier crabs (Dotilla myctiroides) form large concentrations on the beaches.
Shelters deserve special attention. In the simplest case, these animals hide among coral twigs, in crevices between stones or shell valves, and in sponge cavities. But many crabs do not expect favors from nature, but dig holes themselves in viscous silt or sand. These houses may have one straight passage (often quite deep), or several branched passages with emergency exits; alluring crabs equip the entrance to the hole with a lid. Some species settle under the dome of jellyfish, among the tentacles of sea anemones, in the mantle cavity of mollusks, among needles, or even in the rectum of sea urchins.
These minks on one of the beaches of Malaysia were dug by the closest relatives of soldier crabs - scopimers. Each individual, pushing the sand out of the dwelling, rolls it into a neat ball. The droppings of crabs have the same shape when they eat soil.
Crabs have practically no food specialization, they are all omnivores to one degree or another. These animals can eat the bacterial film covering rocks, algae, fallen leaves and flowers, bivalves, polychaete worms, starfish, small crustaceans, and even octopuses. Like crayfish, crabs willingly feast on carrion. Species living in shallow water are happy to “bite” the usual food with soil. Passing sludge through their intestines, they assimilate the microorganisms contained in it. big booty crabs do not just grab, but butcher it like real gourmets. At the same time, they use claws like a knife and fork: they hold the prey with one, and cut off neat pieces with the other.
A grass crab (Carcinus maenas) is about to dine on a bivalve mollusc.
Reproduction in crabs has a pronounced seasonal character, in different types it is associated with certain natural phenomena(rainy season, highest tides). For example, Christmas Island red crabs (Gecarcoidea natalis) live on land far from the coast, but move to the surf line to lay their eggs. Their migration is one of the most grandiose phenomena in nature.
Millions of individuals rush towards the goal like a living river, overcoming roads, ditches and other obstacles along the way.
At this time, crabs die en masse under the wheels of transport and the feet of people who are tired of bypassing countless travelers.
To prevent the death of crabs, barriers are being set up along roads on Christmas Island, directing migrants to bypass dangerous routes.
Notice the insects in the frame. These are yellow crazy ants brought to the island by people. They turned out to be a very aggressive and prolific species and have already destroyed 1/3 of the crab population - 20 million individuals!
No less interesting are the mating battles of alluring crabs. With their hypertrophied signal claw, they threaten rivals and even fencing with it in a collision. Then, with waving movements, they give a signal to the female, as if announcing their victory. Such emphasized ritualism has led to the fact that in many species there is a very noticeable difference between males and females (sexual dimorphism).
Duel of alluring crabs.
Before mating, the couple sometimes becomes in a "face to face" position and may remain in this position for several days. Interestingly, one mating is enough for a female to lay fertilized eggs all her life. This is explained by the fact that the male presents her with sperm packed in special bags - spermatophores. In them, germ cells remain viable for many years; during the next season, the female dissolves the spermatophore membrane with special secretions and fertilization occurs again. The fecundity of crabs is very high and amounts to tens of thousands and millions of eggs. The female bears them on ventral legs from a couple of weeks to several months. The hatched larvae are free-swimming.
Swimming crab larva.
After several molts, they turn into young crabs, which settle in biotopes characteristic of a particular species. The life expectancy of these crustaceans ranges from 3-7 years in small species to 50-70 years in a huge spider crab.
Japanese spider crab (Macrocheira kaempferi).
Due to the great diversity and abundance, crabs have many enemies. Fish, octopuses, crocodiles encroach on their lives, sea stars, seagulls and almost all predatory animals wandering on the coast. Raccoons-crayfish generally specialize in picking up crabs on the shore. Such intense interest from carnivores forced these crustaceans to create a variety of ways to protect themselves. The simplest of them is disguise. It is achieved in some cases by coloring, which very accurately reproduces the color and even the pattern of the substrate on which the given species occurs.
The caramel crab (Hoplophrys oatesii) mimics the color and shape of the dendroneftia coral on which it lives.
In other cases, surrounding objects are used for cover. For example, bashful crabs cover themselves with a shield-shell, decorator crabs cut pieces of bryozoans, hydroids with their claws and plant them on their backs, gluing them with special secretions. On the back of the crab, these colonial animals continue to develop and turn its shell into a flower bed.
It is difficult to recognize a well-camouflaged decorator crab (Camposcia retusa) in this creeping bush.
Dromia crab looks for a sponge and, like a real seamstress, cuts a piece out of it exactly the size of its back.
Dromia crab (Dromia erythropus) resembles an old woman in a beret. Since his body is rather fleshy, the drome has to look for a flap with a curve that perfectly repeats the bulges of his carapace.
If the disguise did not help, active methods of protection are used. Large crabs become in a fighting stance and raise their claws up. If the hint is not understood by the offender, they use their wire cutters and are able to inflict deep cuts. Boxer crabs always keep anemones in their claws, the stinging cells of which are dangerous even for relatively large animals.
A female boxer crab (Lybia tessellata) in a fighting stance with sea anemones. Egg laying is visible on the abdomen of this individual.
Many species are capable of autotomy (self-amputation). At the sight of an enemy, the crab throws off its leg by contraction of special muscles. At the same time, the valves at the place of separation immediately close the wound and stop the bleeding. If such a handout was not enough, the victim offers the next limb to the predator. Severed legs grow back after several molts.
The land hermit crab is a land crab that can drown if it stays in the water for a long time. It lives in the Caribbean Sea, it is also common in Venezuela, the Bahamas, Belize, India, Florida, the Virgin Islands. These crabs are also called tree crabs, tropical land hermit crabs, and Caribbean hermit crabs.
Description of the land hermit crab
There are 7 varieties of tropical land hermit crabs. These crabs reach a length of about 3 centimeters, the weight of an adult reaches 110 grams.
The body shape is cylindrical, elongated. The body is covered with small hairs. The front part of the body is protected by a hard shell, and the abdominal part is much softer.
Land hermit crabs have 5 pairs of legs. The first pair are pincers. With the help of the right claw, the crab eats, and the left one is used for protection, for example, it can close the entrance to the hole in time of danger. Most crabs have claws purple, but they also come in lemon, brown or red. The second and third pair of crab legs are for walking. The last two pairs of legs are very small and sometimes do not protrude from the shell.
Caribbean hermit crabs breathe with gills. There are 2 pairs of retractable antennae: long antennae are used for touch, and short ones perform the function of smell. Land hermit crabs have good eyesight.
When the crab is outside the shell, its sex can be determined: the male has hairs on the last pair of legs, and there are no appendages on the abdominal cavity.
Lifestyle of land hermit crabs
Tree crabs are social animals that live in large groups. They lead a nocturnal lifestyle, their peak activity is observed at 20 o'clock. Land hermit crabs do not like high temperature and the sun, so during the day they hide in small holes, under stones, logs, leaves, and the like.
Land hermit crabs live on the sandy shores of the Caribbean islands, at a distance of 1.8-3.5 kilometers from the water. They are found among coastal plants. They avoid swamps and places with dense vegetation. Hermit crabs prefer low salinity water.
If a tropical land crab is left in the water for a long time, it will drown. Adults molt every 12-18 months, while juveniles molt several times a year. After molting, the crab chooses a new, larger shell.
At temperatures below 20 degrees, the activity of land hermit crabs decreases, and at temperatures below 18 degrees, they hibernate. These crabs can make various sounds: chirping, crackling, croaking.
Tropical land hermit crabs feed at night. They are omnivorous scavengers. Also, their diet includes cactus fruits and even fresh litter of horses and cows. In captivity, they can live up to 11 years.
Reproduction of land hermit crabs
The breeding season for tree crabs is August-October. To mate, males and females have to leave their shells. Young females lay 800-1200 eggs, and adult females - 40-50000 eggs. The color of newly laid eggs is red-brown, within a month they turn blue or gray.
3 weeks after mating, the female goes to shallow water, her eggs are on the 5th leg, she collects them and transfers them to wet stones. The eggs are washed away by the waves into the water.
In the larvae of land hermit crabs, several stages of development are observed: zoe, then glaucotoe, after the young crab. During metamorphosis, the larva settles to the bottom, and then crawls out onto land.
Zoe is thin and long, its size reaches 3 millimeters. She has 2 large eyes. At this stage, the larva feeds on plankton. Zoe makes 3-4 molts, during which it grows.
After 4-5 molts, the larva passes into the stage of glaucotoe. At this stage, it develops very small antennae, eyes are located on stalks, and the first paws are transformed into claws. Glaucotoe looks like an adult crab. This stage lasts about a month, after which the larva grows to 5 millimeters.
Before the last stage, young crabs begin to look for a shell. If a crab comes out of the sea without a shell, it usually dies.
On land, young crabs are active mainly at night, and during the day they hide in various cracks and crevices.
These crabs are kept in terrariums horizontal type. The soil is partially flooded with water, but the water level must be very low, as land hermit crabs drown easily.
Five hundred million years ago, in the waters of the Cambrian seas, among the feathery colonies of anemones, the ancestors of modern crustaceans ran along the bottom, swarming in the silt. In the process of evolution on Earth, more than 70 thousand species of these creatures were formed, of which approximately 7 thousand species are crabs. What are these creatures now, where do they live and what are their sizes - the article tells about this.
What kind of creatures are crabs?
The word "crab" itself comes from the Dutch krab or the German krabbe, a derivative of krabbein, which means "crawl, swarm", derived from the way these animals move.
Crabs are called short-tailed crayfish - special detachment crustaceans. Crayfish belong to the type of arthropods, so named because of the peculiar structure of the legs. The body of these animals is covered with a chitinous shell, which is an exoskeleton. As they grow, crabs shed their old, now small, shell, leaving their soft body defenseless. During the molting period, until the animal has grown a new hard shell, the crabs begin the breeding season.
Five pairs of legs were the reason for calling crustaceans decapods. The front pair of legs, armed with claws, serves as a cancer with arms and weapons. Different types of crayfish have different shapes and lengths of claws. There are individuals with claws of the same length, and there are creatures with claws of different lengths and shapes. The last pair in some aquatic species was transformed in the process of evolution into a kind of oars. Crabs do not know how to swim; they move along the ocean floor on their feet, mostly sideways.
Decapods feed on molluscs, small fish, algae, carrion, everything they find at the bottom or can catch themselves. Crayfish hunt and get food with the help of claws, which can have different purposes. In some species, a larger claw is used to split hard shells or protection, and with a small claw they butcher soft food. Interesting fact Scientists have identified by observing the behavior of crustaceans: among them there are right-handers and left-handers.
Crabs differ from crayfish in the rounded shape of the shell that protects the cephalothorax, internal organs and a short abdomen tucked under the carapace. An interesting feature of the molting of crabs: when molting, the animal sheds the chitinous cover completely, including the eyes, legs, surface internal organs. Having molted several times, an individual can grow severed limbs. Young crabs molt much more often than adults. Some types of crabs molt for the rest of their lives, as they grow constantly. Among those who grow to the end of their days, the most big crabs in the world.
What are the biggest crabs?
Among the many types of crabs, there is no absolute leader in size, but several species are distinguished by very large individuals. To date, the spider crab living in the Sea of Japan is recognized as the champion in size. The diameter of the carapace of a huge individual reaches 1.5 m, and the distance between the straightened claws is up to four meters. The weight of such an instance is more than 40 kg. But this is an isolated case, on average, the size of these arthropods is about half a meter in shell and with a claw span of up to three meters, and a weight of about 20 kg. These creatures live, presumably, up to a hundred years.
The next in size is the royal, or Kamchatka, crab. Individuals with a shell up to thirty centimeters wide and a leg span of up to 1.5 meters reach a weight of about 7 kg, and some specimens approach the ten-kilogram mark. This animal lives in the seas washing the shores Far East and in the Barents Sea, where it was artificially settled.
A little behind the king is a large land crab, known in Russia as brown, or edible. The body is about 25 cm in size, weighing up to three and a half kilograms, making it one of the largest representatives of crustaceans. Isolated cases are known when brown crab reached larger sizes. The range covers the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean.
coconut crab
But not only in the seas live large crabs. The islands of the Indian Ocean are home to the world's largest land crab, the coconut crab. One of the names of this creature is a palm thief, for the habit of dragging to itself everything that lies badly and glitters. Although the palm thief looks like a crab, strictly scientifically it is not. Rather, it is one of the varieties of hermit crab.
The body size of approximately 40 cm makes this crayfish the largest land arthropod. Adult individuals reach a weight within four kilos. The palm thief reaches a similar size by the age of forty, and their life expectancy exceeds sixty years.
Thieves are nocturnal, feeding on plant fruits, small animals, or other members of their own species. Awesome appearance makes it undesirable to meet him at night, but the animals themselves do not pose a threat to humans. Only if, when meeting with a palm thief, you try to grab him, then you can say goodbye to your fingers. The claws of this cancer are adapted to split coconuts, and the strength in the paws is enough to carry a load weighing thirty kilos.
During the day, the palm thief hides in burrows dug in the sand, or in crevices of coastal rocks. Crabs line their shelters with coconut fibers to protect them from drying out. Although the adult crab prefers to live on land due to the peculiarity of breathing, young crab live in coastal waters up to five years old. By the age of five, the size of the carapace of the coconut crab reaches 10 cm, and the gills are rebuilt to breathe atmospheric oxygen. At this age, the young thief moves to land, to a permanent place of residence, never to return to the sea for life.
Crabs reach sexual maturity at the age of ten. After the onset of this age, animals participate in the process of reproduction. Mating of crabs occurs at the moment of molting of females, when the new exoskeleton is still soft and does not interfere with the fertilization of eggs, which the female wears under her abdomen, holding with a pair of legs. Because males shed later than females, mating season they protect females from enemies. After the eggs have matured, the female goes to the sea and lays her eggs in the water at high tide. She does not enter the water at all, since she is no longer able to breathe underwater.
Although thieves love loneliness, from mid-June to the end of August, the desire to procreate takes over and male crabs can smell their mate at a distance of several kilometers. Crustaceans of this species have a highly developed sense of smell, which distinguishes it from representatives of other types of crayfish. Receptors help them smell the opposite sex or the aroma of food. special body sense of smell, which is absent in other crabs.
Although the appearance of a crab can cause a state of horror in an unusual person, the number of these unusual animals is declining every year. The mass catch of young mature individuals and young animals that have not reached maturity has led to a significant reduction in the populations of these crustaceans.
The meat of palm thieves, like other types of crabs, is a delicacy. Tasty, healthy meat of young individuals is highly valued by gourmets around the world. Rich in fatty acids, proteins and iodine, it is considered dietary due to the absence of carbohydrates in it.
The meat of thieves is a universally recognized aphrodisiac that affects men and women. Because of such unique properties The number of crayfish has been greatly reduced, so the authorities of countries where there are populations of these animals have limited hunting for them in order to protect them from extinction.
About what is the largest crab in the world, see the following video.
