The fiddler crab or calling crab may be any of more than one hundred species of semiterrestrial marine crabs in the family Ocypodidae, well known for their sexually dimorphic claws; the males' major claw is much larger than the minor claw, while the females' claws are both the same size. A smaller number of ghost crab and mangrove crab species are also found in the family Ocypodidae. This entire group is composed of small crabs, the largest being slightly over two inches (5 cm) across. Fiddler crabs are found along sea beaches and brackish intertidal mud flats, lagoons, swamps, and various other types of brackish or salt-water wetlands.
Mary Jane Rathbun was an American zoologist who specialized in crustaceans. She worked at the Smithsonian Institution from 1884 until her death. She described more than a thousand new species and subspecies and many higher taxa.
Xanthidae is a family of crabs known as gorilla crabs, mud crabs, pebble crabs or rubble crabs. Xanthid crabs are often brightly coloured and are highly poisonous, containing toxins which are not destroyed by cooking and for which no antidote is known. The toxins are similar to the tetrodotoxin and saxitoxin produced by puffer fish, and may be produced by bacteria in the genus Vibrio living in symbiosis with the crabs, mostly V. alginolyticus and V. parahaemolyticus.
Parthenopidae is a family of crabs, placed in its own superfamily, Parthenopoidea. It comprises nearly 40 genera, divided into two subfamilies, with three genera incertae sedis:
Callianassa is a genus of mud shrimps, in the family Callianassidae. Three of the species in this genus have been split off into a new genus, Pestarella, while others such as Callianassa filholi have been moved to Biffarius. The genus is named after the Nereid of the Greco-Roman mythology.
Palaemon is a genus of caridean shrimp in the family Palaemonidae.
Pseudothelphusidae is a family of freshwater crabs found chiefly in mountain streams in the Neotropics. They are believed to have originated in the Greater Antilles and then crossed to Central America via a Pliocene land bridge. Some species of this family are troglobitic.
Lebbeus is a genus of shrimp in the family Thoridae. It includes a species whose name was auctioned in 2009 to raise funds for conservation; Luc Longley won with a bid of A$3,600. He named the shrimp Lebbeus clarehannah. The following species are included:
Neostrengeria is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Ptychophallus is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae.
Pseudothelphusa is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Chaceus is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Hypolobocera is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, found only in the San Juan River basin which drains into the Pacific, in Colombia. The major and future threats to these species include human-induced habitat loss/degradation and water pollution.
Microthelphusa is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Moritschus is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Orthothelphusa is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Rodriguezus is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Spirothelphusa is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Tehuana is a genus of crabs in the family Pseudothelphusidae, containing the following species:
Tunicotheres is a monotypic genus of crabs in the family Pinnotheridae, and Tunicotheres moseri is the only species in the genus. This crab lives commensally in the atrial chamber of a small ascidian. It is found in the tropical western Atlantic Ocean, the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico.
