A research boat from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute has photographed a huge horde of red crabs swarming across the ocean floor west of Panama.
The crab species is known to be abundant west of Baja California to the north, but this is its southernmost sighting.
The extraordinary thing about it is the numbers of crabs involved. They look like an army of orcs from above, maybe millions of them. In the video, it looks like they are surrounded by clouds, presumably sediment that they are kicking up off the bottom. Bad news for whatever is on the ocean floor wherever they are going.
http://www.sci-news.com/biology/video-sw...03776.html
I've never heard of crabs exhibiting social behavior, so I wonder what caused them to gather together like this in these kind of numbers.
The crab species is known to be abundant west of Baja California to the north, but this is its southernmost sighting.
The extraordinary thing about it is the numbers of crabs involved. They look like an army of orcs from above, maybe millions of them. In the video, it looks like they are surrounded by clouds, presumably sediment that they are kicking up off the bottom. Bad news for whatever is on the ocean floor wherever they are going.
http://www.sci-news.com/biology/video-sw...03776.html
I've never heard of crabs exhibiting social behavior, so I wonder what caused them to gather together like this in these kind of numbers.