Red-claw mangrove crab | |
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Scientific classification ![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Arthropoda |
Class: | Malacostraca |
Order: | Decapoda |
Suborder: | Pleocyemata |
Infraorder: | Brachyura |
Family: | Sesarmidae |
Genus: | Perisesarma |
Species: | P. guttatum |
Binomial name | |
Perisesarma guttatum (Milne-Edwards, 1869) | |
Synonyms | |
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Perisesarma guttatum, the red-claw mangrove crab, [2] is a crab species in the genus Perisesarma and the family Sesarmidae. [3] It is distributed in coastal brackish water habitats of the western Indian Ocean. [4] [5]
Along with the other species within the genus Perisesarma , the red-claw mangrove crab has a relatively square-shaped carapace and a “tooth” protruding off the sides of it. [6] The claw of the crab consists of a palm and dactylus. At the end of the dactylus are oval or circular shaped bumps called tubercles. The part leading up to the claws, the chelar carpus, also has pectinate crests on males within the genus. [6] A pectinate crest is a ridge-like projection on the crab; these ridges line the chelar carpus side-by-side. [7] Different species of Perisesarma vary in the amount of their tubercles in addition to the number of pectinate crests. [6]
P. guttatum have 20 pectinate crests and 11 to 13 oval-shaped tubercles on top of their claws. [6] [8] Their claws are reddish in color with bright orange internal palms. The carapace is about 3 cm in length and between 1.5 and 2.2 cm in width on average in adults. [9] At maturity, males display larger claws than females, showing sexual dimorphism. [9] [3]
P. samawati, a sympatric species, was confused for P. guttatum until more recently, though their morphologies are distinctly different. [10] Unlike P. guttatum, P. Samawati only has 7 to 9 tubercles on the upper surface of their claws. [8] [10] The sizes of their bodies differs as well. [10]
P. guttatum are mangrove inhabitants mostly located by Avicennia marina . The species inhabit these mangroves in east African coasts and Madagascar. [11] Despite increases in pollution from sewage in these areas, the crabs tolerate and are even capable of using the excess nutrients, making them less helpful in measuring mangrove health. [9] [12]
The species use burrows and natural crevices made by Neosarmatium smithi to hide from predators and also for survival. P. guttatum are mainly herbivorous, eating dead plant material and other organic matter foraged from the estuarine or forest floor during low tides. [9] [12] [11] Their diets therefore contribute to leaf turnover and the general removal of matter from the substratum. [13] [10]
Females begin to reach sexual maturity around 2 years old; adults then mate throughout the year, but a study suggests that breeding correlates with lunar phases. [3] Females tend to release their larvae before spring tides, which occur during new and full moons. [3] However, females cannot breed for two consecutive spring tides, which suggests this pattern is seen due to two breeding groups within one population. [3]
During the early stages of life, planktonic larvae move offshore and are distributed with the help of ocean currents. [13] They later return as megalopa larvae – the step in their development that comes after 5 planktonic life stages – and settle in the nearshore environments around where they were once born. [13]
The fiddler crab or calling crab can be one of the hundred species of semiterrestrial marine crabs in the family Ocypodidae. These crabs are well known for their extreme sexual dimorphism, where the male crabs have a major claw significantly larger than their minor claw, whilst females claws are both the same size. The name fiddler crab comes from the appearance of their small and large claw together, looking similar to a fiddle.
The Grapsidae are a family of crabs known variously as marsh crabs, shore crabs, or talon crabs. The family has not been confirmed to form a monophyletic group and some taxa may belong in other families. They are found along the shore among rocks, in estuaries, marshes, and in some cases pelagic among drifting seaweeds and flotsam.
The Grapsoidea are a superfamily of crabs; they are well known and contain many taxa which are terrestrial (land-living), semiterrestrial, or limnic. Another well-known member with a more conventional lifestyle is the Chinese mitten crab, Eriocheir sinensis.
Perisesarma is a genus of mangrove crabs in the family Sesarmidae predominantly found in the Indo-Pacific. Some 23 species are described as of late 2006, with two from West Africa: P. kammermani(De Man, 1883) and P. albertiRathbun, 1921. They are typically small, semiterrestrial crabs found on the forest floor at low tide. They eat nearly anything they can, and try to eat anything that does not threaten them — including pencils and other objects dropped on the forest floor. The last species of the genus described is P. samawatiGillikin and Schubart (2004). It can be found in East Africa along with P. guttatum, but its sister species is P. eumolpe from Malaysian mangroves.
The Gecarcinidae, the land crabs, are a family of true crabs that are adapted for terrestrial existence. Similar to all other crabs, land crabs possess a series of gills. In addition, the part of the carapace covering the gills is inflated and equipped with blood vessels. These organs extract oxygen from the air, analogous to the vertebrate lungs. Adult land crabs are terrestrial, but visit the sea periodically, where they breed and their larvae develop. Land crabs are tropical omnivores which sometimes cause considerable damage to crops. Most land crabs have one of their claws larger than the other.
The Sesarmidae are a family of crabs, previously included in the Grapsidae by many authors. Several species, namely in Geosesarma, Metopaulias, and Sesarma, are true terrestrial crabs. They do not need to return to the sea even for breeding.
Parasesarma erythrodactyla, also known as the red-handed shore crab, is a burrowing crab inhabiting mangrove forests in Australia and Southeast Asia. It is immediately identifiable by its bright red chelipeds (claws) and green/brown carapace.
The Varunidae are a family of thoracotrematan crabs. The delimitation of this family, part of the taxonomically confusing Grapsoidea, is undergoing revision. For a long time, they were placed at the rank of subfamily in the Grapsidae, but they appear to be closest to Macropthalmus and the Mictyridae, which are usually placed in the Ocypodoidea. It may thus be better to merge the latter superfamily with the Grapsoidea, retaining the latter name as it is older.
Austruca perplexa is a species of fiddler crab. It is found from the Ryukyu Islands, Japan to India, throughout the Malay Archipelago, along eastern Australian coasts from Queensland to New South Wales, and in various Pacific islands, including Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu.
Parasesarma leptosoma, also known as the arboreal crab, is an arboreal, leaf-eating mangrove crab, from East and South Africa where it is found on Rhizophora mucronata and Bruguiera gymnorhiza, but not on Avicennia marina. It occupies an ecological niche similar to that of another sesarmid, Aratus pisonii, from the Americas.
Geograpsus lividus is a species of crab in the family Grapsidae. Little research has been conducted on this species. It was originally classified as belonging to the genus Grapsus; however, this name is no longer used.
The violet vinegar crab is a swimming crab species in the genus Episesarma. Distributed all over marine and brackish waters of Indo-West Pacific regions. It is harvested by many local fishermen for rich proteinaceous food.
Haberma tingkok is a species of micro-mangrove crab native to Hong Kong. It was first discovered by Stefano Cannicci from the University of Hong Kong and Peter Ng from the University of Singapore in the Ting Kok Mangrove forests in the northeast of Hong Kong and listed on the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) in April 2017. It was the third species placed in the genus Haberma, which was described in 2002.
Haberma is genus of small mangrove or terrestrial crabs, typically less than 1 centimetre (0.4 in) across the carapace.
Leptuca speciosa, commonly known as the brilliant fiddler crab or the longfinger fiddler crab, is a species of fiddler crab native to the southern United States, Mexico, and the Caribbean.
Parasesarma messa, commonly known as the maroon mangrove crab, is a species of burrowing crab found in Queensland, Australia. It lives in mangroves in estuaries and sheltered bays. It was originally described as Sesarma messa, but was placed in the genus Parasesarma in 2017. Perisesarma messa is also a synonym.
Aratus is a neotropical genus of tree-climbing mangrove crabs in the serarmid family. The genus was first described by Henri Milne-Edwards in 1853, by separating A. pisonii into its own monotypic genus. Aratus has a range spanning Baja California and Sonora, south to Peru along the east Pacific, and from Florida to Brazil in the west Atlantic. Though there has long been attempts to distinguish the Atlantic and Pacific populations of Aratus into separate taxa, it was not until 2014 that sufficient genetic and morphological evidence was collected for the Pacific population to be described as a distinct species.
Sesarmops is a genus of crabs in the family Sesarmidae. Its members are distributed through the Indo-West-Pacific oceanic region. They live in freshwater forest streams near the coast, and in mangroves.
Tiomanium indicum, commonly known as the Tioman crab or the white clawed mangrove crab, is a crab in the family Sesarmidae. It inhabits the Western and central Indo-Pacific ocean, including Singapore, Malaysia, Australia (Queensland), the Philippines and New Guinea. Tioman crabs are supralittoral. In Cairns, Australia they are known for moving in numbers in some seasons entering backyards and homes. This species was originally described by H. Milne Edwards in 1837 as Sesarma indicum. It was placed in a new genus Tiomanium by Serene and Soh The carapace is convex and 34 mm length. Key features that differentiate Tiomanium from Neosarmatium include a spine at the end of the upper inner margin of the cheliped palm and a spine on the upper inner angle of the carpus.
Neosarmatium australiense is a species of mangrove crab in the family Sesarmidae. It is found in Western Australia and the Northern Territory from the Gulf of Carpentaria to the Kimberley coast, the only Neosarmatium in the area. They are known for moving in large numbers to the coast following heavy rains after the northern dry season.