Gettin' crabby in Oregon (part 2)

Oh yeah, we're still going to

I last left off with my friends and me discovering a still-very-alive smooth bay shrimp and putting it back in the ocean. As we reached the jetty near Yaquina Bay and admired the sunset, we found another little crustacean first thought to be dead.

"I'm so thirsty!" - purple shore crab

He was a little purple shore crab (Hemigrapsus nudus)! He was very nude, but we tried not to make him feel too self conscious about it. I'm not sure why purple shore crabs are also called 'naked shore crabs' since all crabs are naked save for maybe decorator crabs (when they dress up and look fabulous!), but I think it hails from a comparison with the other common shore crabs nearby, the hairy shore crab (Hemigrapsus fully-dressed-icus oregonensis). You see, the purple shore crab has smooth legs whereas the hairy shore crab has lots of little hair-like setae along its legs and claws.

 "That's right! I'm as bald as Patrick Stewart!" - purple shore crab

Like the smooth bay shrimp we found, this purple shore crab also gave us some signs of life so we quickly found a sheltered spot for him in the water by the rocks.

We have one last stop in our Oregon adventure, so don't go too far!

Gettin' crabby in Oregon (part 1)

It's time for another adventure! Let's

I mentioned in the last post that I was headed to Oregon for a wedding. It was beautiful and touching and just plain fun! The next day we took advantage of our proximity to the coast and headed out for a walk near the Yaquina Bay State Recreation Site. I wasn't expecting to see much other than waves, sand, and sun, but my friend Alice spotted this little fellow:

a sandy-colored smooth bay shrimp

We thought it was dead since it was just lying in the wash zone of the beach. Either my husband or Alice went to pick it up (I don't remember who) and it flipped away from us! We all gave a jump and a scream, then picked it up and put it back in the ocean! It was a good start to a fun beach walk!

This little shrimp isn't just your average cocktail ingredient. Oh no, he's got quite the story. Smooth bay shrimp (Lissograngon stylirostris) host a nasty little parasite named Argeia pugettensis, a bopyrid isopod. The isopod will attach itself to a shrimp's gills and use the shrimp's carapace as an extra layer of shelter. The first one to attach to the shrimp develops into a female.

"Last one to the shrimp is a rotten egg male!" - parasitic isopod

Any subsequent parasite to enter that shrimp's gills will become male and fertilize the female parasite's eggs. Once the little larvae hatch, they head out in search of an intermediate host (namely a calanoid copepod) to ruin someone else's day develop further until it can start the whole process over again by swimming up into a shrimp's gills.

"Gross Steve, you've got something on your back!" - Larry the shrimp

"AH! Larry, you've got something on YOUR back!" - Steve the shrimp

 "AHHH!" - Larry and Steve

"AHHHHHH!" - all the shrimp EVERYWHERE!

Luckily for the shrimp we found, it wasn't infected with anything.

Yet.

(Dun-dun-dun!)

Stay tuned to see more of our beach discoveries!

Let's Review

Happy New Year!

I'm so excited for what 2014 has to bring! The most recent thing will be our dear friends' wedding this weekend, so I feel like we're starting the year off on the right foot! Before we head out to celebrate I wanted to look back on 2013 (like I did last year with 2012). So, without further ado, here are the top 10 posts from last year:

10. Let's talk about crabs, baby!

This was a review of a different color: going over the most recent crab chat I had with some Deadliest Catch fans! I answered the question, "Who can fish in Alaskan waters" immediately, but I'm realizing that I still need to write a post about those infamous crab farts! Hooray for 2014!

9. Cod are just like people

Cod like to eat snow crabs and my fellow University of Alaska Fairbanks alum Laurinda Marcello tells us how that affects the snow crab population. A lot of you guys already know the answer to that, but for those of you who haven't read the post, click the link to see if snow crabs should be more afraid of cod or themselves!

8. Happy New Year!

WOOOO! You guys like to party just as much as this hermit crab!

 um, you got a little something on your face.

7. Trading WHAT for protection?

Fiddler crabs: just when you think you might start liking them, they go and do something like this. What's the "this"? Living a 'free love' lifestyle in the name of property protection. You do what you gotta do, fiddler crab females, just don't expect me to bring a casserole over for the next "potluck" you throw, OK?

dang it! why do they have to be so cute!?!

6. I *crab heart* you!

You guys really saw the beauty in crab hearts just like I did. I hope it was a happy Valentine's Day for anyone who used my crab heart card!

5. Giving a whole new meaning to "shrimp"

Who knew shrimp embryos could be so endearing?

4. Big Ol' Crab!

In complete contrast to #5, this post was all about the largest recorded snow crab ever. I had to guestimate the actual size based on weight and crudely photoshop a picture, but you all got the idea.

3. Say "AAAAAAAH!!!"

AAAAAAAH!!!

2. hermit crabs do the twist

Come on hermit crab, let's do the twist! (Any Chubby Checker fans out there?) You guys must have been really interested in hermit crab abdomens and whether or not they twist the same way. Either that or you really liked my Beyoncé joke.

1. King crabs are red,

King crabs are blue,
This post taught you all,
How to tell the difference!

"I'm red" - Paralithodes camtschaticus

"I'm blue" - Paralithodes platypus

It also taught you that I'm a terrible poet.

Well, that's it! Let's see what 2014 has to offer!

One more thing...

... before we go into the new year and I forget about this craft! As you may know, I have a crab cookie cutter, and while I got my fill of crab-shaped cookies this year I wanted to make one more craft during the holiday season. That's when I saw this craft and modified it for you to make:

Nautical Cinnamon Ornaments

(I looked up "cinnamon crabs" to see if I could tie it into a Crabday, but no luck there, folks.)

What you need:

3/4 cup applesauce
1 cup + 2 tbsp cinnamon
Tools: bowl, cookie cutters, a straw, and ribbon or string

That's it!

Mix the applesauce and cinnamon in a bowl. You can use a spoon or your hands. This stuff is messy! I used a spoon first then finished kneading with my hands at the very end before rolling it out.

Total honesty moment here: I didn't know if my mixture was perfect. I watched this video and the woman says, "If this mixture seems too dry to you..." and I was all, "How do I know if it's too dry or wet?" I based it off of how frustrated I got when cutting the shapes out: if they crumbled (which they did), I added a bit more applesauce. If they stuck to the inside of the cookie cutter (which they did), I added a bit more cinnamon. It wasn't pretty, but at least I smelled good while doing it.

So, back to rolling out the dough: put the mixture between two sheets of plastic wrap then gently roll out to about 1/4-inch thickness.

Cut your shapes and place them on a baking sheet. Once they're on the baking sheet, you can use the straw to poke out little holes for your string or ribbon. You need to do this before they're baked!

shapes set and ready to be transferred to the baking sheet

Bake these bad boys at 200 degrees F for 2.5 hours. You can also simply leave them someplace dry for 1 or 2 days if you don't want to run your oven for that long. I did a slight combination of the two (I ran out of time with this craft and needed the oven to bake our Christmas ham!) so I let them dry for a day after they had baked for an hour and a half.

Once they're nice and dry, you can decorate them with paint or metallic markers, or leave them plain. Hang them on your tree and enjoy the warm scent of cinnamon for holidays to come! (Just don't eat 'em! Seriously. Don't.)

Some of the finished ornaments! (See the other crab ornament back there?)

Adam wanted the crab to have different colors

on the tips of its claws like a white-tipped mud crab:

Rhithropanopeus harrisii, aka cute little mud crab!

We saw these little guys all over the place when we lived on Long Island. I'm also a bit smitten because some of them are Polish (albeit invasive from North America), just like my husband and me! (We're Polish, not invasive.)

Oh geez, this post got away from me. Onward to the New Year!

Merry Christmas 2013!

Merry Christmas!

This holiday season was another one filled with friends, family, and cookies! Sherry Tamone hosted another cookie cooking extravaganza and this was our haul:

cookies, good company, and wine!

She made several crab sugar cookies for us to decorate. I took advantage of some of the broken ones by making this Frankencrab:

"I'm a monster!"

He reminded me of all the crabs and lobsters I've seen with multiple claws where they should only have one. No one can really pinpoint why that happens, but I imagine it's some sort of crossed signaling that occurs during regeneration and molting.

this claw belongs to an edible crab (Cancer pagurus) found off of the UK - 

normally their claws have a crushing strength of 90 lb/square inch, 

so I wonder if this one has 180 lbs/square inch!?!?

Frankencrab or not, everyone deserves a happy holiday!

Sitka Spot Shrimp in Prince William Sound

I spent the first week of December on a boat in Prince William Sound looking for whales! I mean, can someone pinch me? That degree is really paying off!

(thanks to Jess from the Prince William Sound Science Center for this photo)

Anyways, I was out on the Auklet for a long term monitoring project and our first night out we had so many Sitka spot shrimp!

What a catch! And they're all headed too... weird...

No, they're not a new invasive species - they were just purchased for dinner.

Amazing! Thank you again to Gerald for feeding me right!

Spot shrimp range into Prince William Sound normally (remember this project where I processed spot shrimp, coonstripe shrimp, and pink shrimp from PWS?), but the ones we ate were caught off of Sitka. The fishery is great because they are mainly caught in pots meaning fishermen aren't dredging up a ton of bycatch in order to land these tasty crustaceans!

After polishing off all the shrimp, we used their shells to lure any fish under the boat toward our camera. And let me tell you, the pollock seemed to enjoy the shrimp just as much as the humans!

the smelly allure of shrimp carapaces!

fishy action caught in Rocky Bay!

(photo courtesy of Dave Janka) 

It was an amazing trip and I'm so glad I was able to nerd out not only with whales and fish but with my beloved crustaceans too!

Crab Turkey!

Not to be confused with a jive turkey, a crab turkey is something wonderful that I just made up. Because I can. It's a turkey made out of, you guessed it: crabs!

kind of, crab-dressed-as-a-turkey, kind of

I love Thanksgiving but wanted more Thanksgiving decor around my house (this guy is rockin' the "give thanks" message, but he needed friends). What a perfect excuse for a paper craft, amirite? Here's the final product:

so colorful!

And here's how you can make your own:

1. Download this PDF and print it - card stock is best but plain paper works just fine

2. Color in the turkey body and 3 crabs (Don't mistake the turkey for a penguin like Adam did. Although you could make an all black-and-white crab turkey that would probably look pretty sweet!)

the husband hard at work

my (almost) finished coloring job

note: the circles making up the crab body will be covered up,

so you don't need to color them in

3. Cut out the pieces - I know the legs are skinny, so there are a few options:
a. Thicken the legs with your coloring implement
b. Don't cut out the individual legs but leave them as one big ol' crab leg unit
c. Cut around the individual legs leaving a white border - I did that for Adam's turkey and it really makes the bright colors POP!

option a on the top and b on the bottom

4. Glue them all together - the order, from front to back, goes penguin turkey body, small crab, medium crab, large crab. The crabs will all line up with their big circular bodies (carapaces). To line up the turkey body with its crab-turned-feathers, I bent the legs of both the turkey and the crabs before gluing so that I could make sure it would stand properly.

crab turkeys playing amongst the pumpkins

5. Enjoy your new crab-inspired Thanksgiving decoration! I think they could make great place cards for the kiddie table or you could write dish descriptions on their little bellies.

Oh, I don't know if you noticed, but I added little tubercles to my crabs' claws. We've seen those tiny calcium carbonate bumps on other crabs like the purple land crab pictured below and the warty crab.

tubercles and turkeys - they go claw in claw!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!