Dancing with Dinosaurs

Have you ever sat back and wondered what life was like 100 years ago? 200? Perhaps a millennium? Four? Did you ever ask yourself hey, I really wish I could have met a dinosaur? Or perhaps a creature so unique it has ten eyes, an outer shell, and most closely related to a spider?

Well then you need to look no further than the bay beaches in southern New Jersey. Here every spring the weather flip flops between icy cold and blazing hot, green head flies pillage and plunder, and mosquitos gorge in such a way to put Dracula to shame. But its all part of the joy of being Jersey born and bred. This is just a fact of life and native New Jerseyans know no different.

The best phenomena to occur during the spring is the reemergence of the horseshoe crab. This incredibly inept crustacean wannabes come dancing up along the shore. The slow and steady spiral tread marking their journey from the depths. For them, its breeding season, and it’s time to get down to business. If you know what I mean.

To watch them travel around the beaches in swirling paths is to watch history unfold. The horseshoe crab has been a part of this earth for 450 million years. They have outlived four mass extinctions and had once walked with dinosaurs. Many scientists today believe they are the oldest creature still alive today. They are truly magnificent for an abundance of reasons, and unfortunately, they are also quite stupid.

I mean this with all the love and affection one would have for a ditzy relative. Or a friend who sometimes fails in the commonsense department. I spend every spring with a group dedicated to saving the lives of these blue-blooded beauties. The thing about these prehistoric heroes is, they are vitally important to both man and bird.

There is a species of bird, called the Red Knot, that migrate from the Artic to somewhere in South America. And one of the only stops these flying friends stop is-you guessed it—along the Delaware Bay. To feast upon horseshoe crab eggs.

In addition to helping keep a species of bird alive, these exoskeleton extinction evading cuties are crucial to helping human medicines. To quote www.animalogic.ca, “Horseshoe crab blood is blue in colour, due to the presence of copper. But that’s not why it’s valuable. It’s valuable because it contains an “amebocyte” used in the field of biomedics to identify bacterial contamination in vaccines and all injectable drugs.”

Now its up to us to help keep this creature alive since we are directly responsible for causing its destruction. Between over harvesting for their blood, habitat loss to over development, and climate change we are menacing their ability to survive. There would be no way to describe how disgusting it would be to eliminate a species that has survived so long; simply because man cannot contain their baser natures.

I have mentioned a few times, the lack of intelligence of the horseshoe crab. I mean this with irony. One of the main duties in my volunteer group is to just flip them over.

Literally.

These helmet headed hotties will tumble in the tide and land on their backs. And slowly bake in the sun or become prey to gulls and other shore birds. Simply because the act of flipping themselves over is hard. The long-pointed tail helps aid them in this most tricky task. But sometimes, it just doesn’t work for them. Its extremely important when we help flip them, you do not pick them up by their tails. They can break easily and also house one of their many eyes. Grab the side and give a little flip. They cannot pinch you. Thanks to over development along the bay we also have to help pull the crab from areas they have gotten impinged by fencing, barriers, or jammed into rubble.

So yes, how I captured this picture. It’s the same way I capture all my horseshoe crab pictures. I roll around in the sand blinded by the sun or squinting in the dark and blindly snap away on my camera.

Most important to me, when I saw this challenge was a perfect opportunity for me to discuss this wonderful creature and how humans every where have an obligation to help them. For yourself, a loved one, the birds, and hell for the dinosaurs who didn’t make it as long as the horseshoe crab did.

Just please, flip em over kids.

Side note: all pictures have been taken by me.