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Sea Otters Play Big Role in Preventing Erosion
How Sea Otters
Saved a Salt Marsh
NEW STUDY

How Sea Otters Saved a Salt Marsh

Erosion slowed dramatically after they returned to the area and feasted on shore crabs

(Newser) - Vital salt marsh habitat in California was saved by a resurgence of the area's extremely cute top predator, researchers say. In a study published in the journal Nature , marine ecologist Brent Hughes and other researchers say sea otters dramatically slowed erosion in Elkhorn Slough in Monterey Bay, the nation'...

10B Alaskan Snow Crabs Vanished. We Now Know Why
10B Alaskan Snow Crabs
Vanished. We Now Know Why
new study

10B Alaskan Snow Crabs Vanished. We Now Know Why

Study blames marine heat waves in Bering Sea off the coast of Alaska

(Newser) - An astounding number of Alaskan snow crabs disappeared from the Bering Sea over the last several years, and scientists say they've finally discovered why. A new paper published in Science blames marine heat waves in 2018 and 2019 for the decimation of 90% of the snow crab population through...

Crabs Face Double Whammy: From Scientists and Birds

The AP looks at the plight of horseshoe crabs, whose blood is sought for medicine

(Newser) - A primordial sea animal that lives on the tidal mudflats of the East Coast and serves as a linchpin for the production of vital medicines stands to benefit from new protective standards. But conservationists who have been trying for years to save a declining bird species that depends on horseshoe...

Finding Puts 'Extra Nail in the Coffin' on Neanderthal Theory

Prehistoric humans loved a good roasted crab, dispelling notion they didn't enjoy seafood

(Newser) - Prehistoric humans may not have had Red Lobster or Long John Silver's, but that doesn't mean they didn't enjoy a good seafood sit-down as much as their modern-day relatives. In fact, scientists have determined that Neanderthals quite enjoyed crab, which they caught by the shore, then roasted...

Crab Season Is Axed, but Deadliest Catch Will Go On

Producers say captains will seek other catches

(Newser) - The snow crab season in Alaska has been canceled but producers say the move won't scuttle hit Discovery reality show Deadliest Catch, which is now in its 18th season. Producers say the show's 19th season will involve other, presumably less deadly, catches. "Fans can anticipate another great...

Alaska's Most Valuable Crab Populations All but Vanished

Higher temperatures may be behind drastic decline

(Newser) - Where did the Alaskan king and snow crabs go? The tasty crustaceans have all but vanished from their usual haunts within safe range of Alaska’s crabbing fleet. Per the Washington Post, king crabs—by far the larger of the two species—have been in decline for years, but the...

Novel Solution to Invasive Crabs: Turn Them Into Whiskey

New Hampshire distillery makes new flavor out of troublesome green crabs

(Newser) - Care for a hint of crab in your whiskey? A New Hampshire distillery has come up with its newest concoction called “Crab Trapper"—whiskey flavored with invasive green crabs, per the AP . Tamworth Distilling's Matt Power said the company heard about the problems caused by the green...

UK Set to Acknowledge These Creatures Have Feelings

Crab, octopus, and other cephalopods, decapods, vertebrates to be classified as sentient beings

(Newser) - A bill designating octopus, lobster, crab, and other animals as sentient beings capable of experiencing feelings and sensations including pain and distress, now moving through the UK parliament , could transform how such animals are treated in the country. The bill, which would see the creation of an Animal Sentience Committee...

Big Pharma Has Bad News for Crabs
Big Pharma Has
Bad News for Crabs

Big Pharma Has Bad News for Crabs

Looks like a synthetic substitute to crab blood won't be officially adopted after all

(Newser) - Big Pharma is out for blood—horseshoe crabs' blood, that is—and that's not about to change. An effort to promote a synthetic substitute to crab blood in medical safety tests fell short Friday when a powerful US group refused to fully back the switch, Reuters reports. The group,...

Buffet Erupts in Brawl Over Crab Legs

2 diners in Alabama were arrested

(Newser) - Two people were arrested after diners at a buffet restaurant in Alabama got extremely crabby. Huntsville police officer Gerald Johnson says he had just gotten his food at the Meteor Buffet when a brawl erupted among diners who had been waiting for crab legs. "There's a woman who'...

PETA's New Billboard Isn't Pleasing Baltimore

Group is trying to get people to stop eating crabs, and locals are mocking it

(Newser) - PETA scored a PR win this week when the makers of Animal Crackers agreed to remove the animals on its boxes from cages. But the animal-rights group's newest initiative isn't faring as well, reports the Baltimore Sun . Why? A new billboard in Baltimore is trying to get folks...

Crab Is Seen Hunting a Bird in 'Gruesome' First

Coconut crabs were previously thought to be scavengers

(Newser) - Seabirds apparently have a surprising new predator to worry about. A researcher who worked on the Chagos Islands in the Indian Ocean in 2016 says he witnessed a large coconut crab attack a sleeping seabird, which then became dinner. Mark Laidre of Dartmouth College says he first spotted a crab...

We Suck Horseshoe Crabs' Blood, Chuck Them in Sea
We Suck Horseshoe Crabs'
Blood, Chuck Them in Sea
LONGFORM

We Suck Horseshoe Crabs' Blood, Chuck Them in Sea

It's all in the name of human health—but what happens to the crabs afterward?

(Newser) - The horseshoe crab has been around since prehistoric days, but some experts are now worried the biomedical industry is bleeding them dry—literally. In her story for Popular Mechanics , Caren Chesler explores how retrieving the blue blood of the marine invertebrate has become a lucrative and essential industry, thanks to...

Officials: Don't Eat Toxic California Crabs

What a way to open crab season

(Newser) - El Niño—already being blamed for bringing venomous snakes to the California coastline—could be at it again, as state health officials warned of poisonous crabs Tuesday, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The warning to avoid eating any crabs caught along the Northern California coast couldn't come at...

Tiny Tuna Crabs Invade Calif. Beaches

'Mini-lobsters' turn shorelines red

(Newser) - Tiny tuna crabs have been washing up by the thousands on beaches in California's Orange County. The Orange County Register reports that the crustaceans, which look like tiny lobsters or crawfish, created a bright-red rim along the shoreline of Dana Point, San Clemente, Newport Beach, and Huntington Beach yesterday....

Flight Delay Caused by Escaped Crabs

US Airways had to round them up before taking off

(Newser) - And the week's weirdest reason for a flight delay goes to US Airways, which had to catch loose crabs in a cargo hold before letting a plane fly from New York to Charlotte, NC. A spokeswoman says it's unclear how the small crustaceans escaped their container or what...

Surprise: This Red King Crab Is ... Blue

Alaska fisherman catches an oddity

(Newser) - It's called a red king crab, but one caught in Nome, Alaska, didn't get the memo: It turned up in fisherman Frank McFarland's pot as a lovely shade of blue, reports KNOM . (The oddity first showed up on the front page of the Nome Nugget .) A...

CO2 Levels Are Super-Sizing Crabs

Crustaceans bulk up as carbon levels rise

(Newser) - Carbon emissions usually make news for their effect on the climate, but they're also having a major impact on marine ecosystems in the form of creating huge crustaceans, the Washington Post finds. In the Chesapeake Bay area and many others, oyster and scallop populations are dropping as crabs—who...

Eyeless Shrimp? Report Raises Concerns in Gulf

Mutant creatures showing up after BP spill, says Al Jazeera English

(Newser) - Shrimp missing their eyeballs (and even eye sockets), fish covered in lesions, deformed crabs, and other mutated sea creatures are showing up in unsettling numbers in the Gulf of Mexico two years after the giant BP oil spill, according to an investigation by Al Jazeera English . "The fishermen have...

Humans Wiped Out Hawaii Land Crab

They vanished about the time people arrived

(Newser) - Hawaii used to have land crabs that lived high up in the hills and wandered down to the ocean now and then—until humans came along and wrecked the party. Newly discovered fossils show that the creatures, which lived farther inland than most crabs and dined on insects and small...

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