Deep Sea Giant Hermit Crab, Dardanus insignis

by | Nov 21, 2015 | Reef, Science | 0 comments


Hey gang, here’s one of the largest deep-sea hermit crabs (about the size of a grapefruit) I have seen to date, named Dardanus insignis, the “southern form”. The crab was living in a very light-weight, fragile shell that had a big hole in the top; you can see it just over his eyes. And that thing is on his shell that looks like a sideways volcano is a live anemone! How cool is that?? If disturbed, the anemone closes up and looks like a big fleshy lump, but it opens back up pretty quickly. In addition to the anemone, the crab also had live tunicates stuck to his shell and heaven only knows what else, truly one of the coolest crabs I have seen MORE

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