Brown box crab | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Scientific classification
![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Arthropoda |
Class: | Malacostraca |
Order: | Decapoda |
Suborder: | Pleocyemata |
Infraorder: | Anomura |
Family: | Lithodidae |
Genus: | Echidnocerus |
Species: | E. foraminatus
|
Binomial name | |
Echidnocerus foraminatus (
Stimpson, 1860)
|
The brown box crab (Echidnocerus foraminatus) is a king crab that lives from Prince William Sound, Alaska to San Diego, California, [1] at depths of 0–547 metres (0–1,795 ft). [2] It reaches a carapace length of 150 millimetres (5.9 in) and feeds on bivalves and detritus. The box crab gets its name from a pair of round tunnel-like openings that form between the claws and adjacent legs when the animal folds its limbs up against its body. [3] Both claws, and their adjacent legs, have matching half-circle notches in them that line up to create a circle-shaped opening when the limbs are tightly pulled against one another. [3] This tubular round opening is called a foramen. The crab often lies buried in the sediment, and the two foramens in the chelipeds allow water into the gill chamber for respiration. [1] The gill chamber is also sometimes used by the commensal fish Careproctus to hold its eggs. [4]
The brown box crab has been fished in California since at least 1984. [5] Take was minor and largely incidental until the mid 2010s, when landings by mass increased five-fold in 2017 relative to 2016 [6] and have remained above 45,000 lbs every year since. [5] In 2019, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife launched an experimental fishery for brown box crabs. [6]