Sex On The Beach: Locals turn out for the annual horseshoe crab mating ritual
It was the first full night of the Rose Moon of June, and the Denison Pequotsepos Nature Center was hosting its annual field trip to watch the horseshoe crab spawning migration. The crabs have been doing this on full moons in May and June for a couple of million years. In fact, horseshoe crabs, more closely related to ticks and spiders than crabs, predate man and even dinosaurs. They are so old they are considered living fossils.
The crabs generally come up the beach with the very high tides of the spring full moons. The females, larger and faster swimmers, set the pace and find a place to burrow into the sand and lay their eggs. The males are close behind, attached in fact, as they hang on with pinchers to the females. They then fertilize the eggs deposited in the sand. The crabs leave with the tide, and can remain attached, sometimes for periods up to a year.
The crabs are not endangered, but they are at risk from poachers because they are valuable when ground up as fish bait. A decline in the population would affect shorebirds, who feed off surplus eggs laid in the spring, she added. It's illegal in Connecticut to take horseshoe crabs in May and June. The pharmaceutical industry uses horseshoe crabs for their blood, but they have a program to release them after they are captured and bled.
The crabs also risk a sort of accidental death during the spawning migration, when they get overturned by waves at the tide line. They can use their long tails to right themselves, but when they are unable to they are easy prey for sea gulls. The empty shells seen on beaches are usually evidence that a crab couldn't right itself.
For more information go to: Horseshoe Crab Research Institute, www.horseshoecrab.com
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