Hey, Where's the Rest of that Horseshoe Crab?

By B

Hi friends, are you ready to talk about horseshoe crabs? Good!



Horseshoe Crab Molt
Found in Bonner Park, Largo, FL



Lately I've been finding lots of what I thought were small dead horseshoe crabs. I wondered what was killing them. Then I noticed these horseshoe crabs don't weigh very much. I did a little reading (and asked my mom) and found out that these aren't really horseshoe crabs – they are just their exoskeletons!

(I love the word exoskeleton. We used to find lots of cicada exoskeletons when we lived in Kentucky.)

Things with hard shells can't grow as long as that shell is there. So they have to molt, or get rid of their shell for a while so they can get bigger. What a relief! I'm glad they weren't all dead. Plus the shed shells smell much better than dead crabs when you save them for your collection.

I hope you enjoyed this story about horseshoe crabs. Bye until next time!

Horseshoe Crab Facts from Lu:

*Horseshoe crabs are arthropods, a group that includes insects, spiders and crabs.

*They aren't really crabs – they're more closely related to spiders and scorpions.

*When horseshoe crabs are in love, they pair up and go to very shallow water (the intertidal region, between high and low tide) and the female lays up to 120,000 eggs. It is thought that, like sea turtles, they return to the same beach where they were born to lay their eggs.

*Horseshoe crabs have blue blood!

*Young horseshoe crabs molt several times a year, while older ones usually molt only once each year, usually in summer. (Which is probably why B was finding smaller molts this winter... though since this is Florida, some seasonal things are skewed, and I'd guess you can find adult sheds year-round.)

Save a Horseshoe Crab!

Horseshoe crab numbers are declining, for several reasons. Habitat loss is a biggie. They are also used as bait for whelk and eel traps, and their unique blood is harvested for medical use. (They are usually released after blood draw, but the mortality rate is still as high as 15% in some cases.)

Many will also die during mating season when they are flipped on their backs as the tide is going out. In the water they can usually right themselves, but on land they'll die of exposure unless you help. Save a horseshoe crab's life by simply flipping her (or him) back over. They are absolutely harmless – they don't bite or pinch. Don't pick them up by their tail, which is deceptively fragile. Just grasp them by the side of the shell, turn them over and help save the species.

You can also help by reporting signs of spawning to the Florida Horseshoe Crab Survey of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. If you see two horseshoe crabs in love (as B and I put it) let them know!

(Florida horseshoe crabs can mate year-round, but mostly in spring. I'll try to remind you again around then.)

Wood Storks Kicked Off The Endangered List



Photo courtesy of Daniel Prentice,
our beloved nephew/cousin.
 The girl in the photo has been made rather awkwardly anonymous
 because we don't know who she is.



Apparently, once a bird starts behaving like a seagull, it is no longer endangered. B and I spotted this wood stork in Lake Seminole Park, lurking near picnickers like an angelic buzzard, an elegant harpy. One little boy told me it stole his hamburger. (Though I think he might have been complicit.) Another girl, left alone at the picnic table, engaged in a staring match with the stork as it edged closer and closer. The bird was about as tall as she was. At last she bribed it with some lettuce, which it nosed through in a disappointed way before begging for better fare. It harassed the picnickers – in a very mild mannered, patient, lugubrious sort of way – for the whole hour I was at the park.

(A lecture about how very, very wrong it is to feed most wildlife will follow in some future blog.)

Despite their bald heads and necks (or maybe because of it – I'm very fond of vultures too) wood storks are beautiful birds. They are one of the species success stories I've been able to witness in my lifetime. When I was a little girl, wood storks were rare and wondrous things. I might see a couple every year. Now, in Pinellas County, I can see dozens in a day, wading in parks or soaring overhead on rising air currents.

By my own observations, they seem to have made a remarkable comeback. In fact, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently recommended that the wood stork be removed from the endangered species list. I wonder if this is a good idea, though. Because even though I've seen a lot of wood storks, not very many actually nest in Florida, particularly compared with the hundred thousand or so that used to nest here. Their colonies have rebounded in Georgia and the Carolinas, but here in Florida they just don't breed like they used to. If a species is expanding other places, but not breeding as well in its historic range, isn't there still a problem?

It probably doesn't matter in actual practice – the species is still considered threatened, and most regulations should still be in effect. Where it matters is in people's mindsets. They are endangered because their habitat is in danger, and we need that big, scary word – ENDANGERED – as a tool to help people remember how important it is to preserve wood storks and save wetlands.

Wetland restoration and species preservation have come a long way in the last several decades. And I know FWS must want the sense of victory that comes with declaring that a species is no longer endangered. It shows they are doing their job. But I think it is a little too soon to strip wood storks of their endangered status. Even if they are acting like seagulls.

You can voice your opinion at Regulations.gov – http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=FWS-R4-ES-2012-0020-0001 through February 25, 2013.The site also has some of the data that led to the decision, as well as interesting information on wood storks in general.

Hello from B

Hello! My name is B. Today I am going to tell you why I want to start a nature blog.



Cownose Ray
photo by Todd Poling, via Wikimedia Commons



Since I was a little boy (Lu interjects: ha!) I loved nature. I love marine science most of all. My favorite marine animals are nurse sharks, cownose rays, sheepshead and mullet. I have lots of books about fish and reef creatures.





Monarch butterfly
photo by Korall via Wikimedia Commons
(Seriously, we'll start taking our own photos soon!)



I also like lots of bugs. Bugs are really nice because they are colorful and easy to find. I can go on a bug safari in my own back yard! Now I'll tell you my favorite kinds of bugs. Caterpillars are really cool because they change into butterflies. I also like carpenter ants that sneak into my mom's house. I like bees, flies and ladybugs. I like spiders and centipedes, too (even though they aren't bugs!)

Another animal that I really like is the tree frog. I saw a real tree frog before – it jumped on me and freaked me out! But after that I decided I really like them.

While working on this blog, I'm going to share the things I know, the things my mom teaches me, and the things she and I learn together. I want you and your friends to learn about nature with me.

Bye, friends! I'll see you on the blog!

Pining for nature

I have become a creature of air conditioning.

Now, don't get me wrong – it is a wonderful invention that makes half of the planet habitable, and I really hate hearing stories from my assorted ancestors about how they did just fine without climate control, because I know they suffered. They just forget.

But my life has somehow become an indoor existence, and it isn't right. When I was a kid I was always outside. Usually in the backyard or the beach, or a patch of woods near my house that was probably full of molesters and druggies after dark, but which in daylight was a paradise of hawks and snakes and gopher tortoises.

Now I spend most of my time sitting in my air conditioned room, writing. On the plus side, I'm doing what I love and get to wear pajamas all day. On the down side, particularly in the last half-year when I was on a tight deadline, I spend so much time creating worlds that I don't have much time left to experience the real one. That's bad for me as a writer, and as a person.

I used to have time just to lie on my belly and stare at a patch of grass, at the myriad bits of life in a few square inches. I used to sit and marvel at fungi, for goodness sake. I used to be able to tell a cormorant from an anhinga on sight. What happened? I've become an indoor person, and I'm starting to find these four walls hampering. I have to make time for nature.