WEST YARMOUTH — I'm not sure if horseshoe crabs have ever heard of Salvador Dali, the mustachioed artist who once said: "Have no fear of perfection — you'll never reach it."
If they were Dali fans, the crabs would probably reply: "Dude, you've got that wrong! Look at us — we've had the same basic form for hundreds of millions of years. We watched the dinosaurs come and go and we kept on trucking. If ever there was a perfect form, it's us!"
I've got to agree with the horseshoe crabs. Nobody does it better. Fashions and epochs come and go and they stay the same like an eternal Volkswagen Beetle. They are cool and crusty and mysterious and I love them.
That's why I was so alarmed when a reader sent in the following Curious Cape Cod question: "Sea Gull Beach in Yarmouth has more dead horseshoe crabs than I’ve ever seen! Is this because of all the seagulls? Or are the seagulls there for the dead crabs?"
I was flabbergasted! Could this mean the end of days for one of my favorite animals? What else could I do but jump in the Curious Prius and head for the supposedly grisly scene.
The wind was whipping in from Nantucket Sound when I touched down at Sea Gull Beach. I headed for the wrack line, just past a lonely lifeguard stand. There they were! Hundreds of horseshoe crab shells stretched across the sand in various states of disrepair, like a pileup on the interstate. I accidentally stepped on one and the crunch made me jump.
Despair crept in like a bitter high tide. Only a stop at Marion's Pie Shop in Chatham on the way home staunched the woe. Soon, I thought, all the horseshoe crabs in the world would be taking a perpetual sand nap at Sea Gull. The creature nicknamed "living fossil" would just be a regular fossil — alas!
With nowhere else to turn, I reached out to Karl von Hone, Yarmouth's director of natural resources and a steady hand in these matters. When he replied to my email, the sun broke through the crab-shaped clouds. "They are not dead horseshoe crabs," he wrote, "but cast-off shells from the molting process. The increase in the number of casts likely relate (to) a growing population in Nantucket Sound."
Talk about a 180-degree turn: the scene at Sea Gull Beach isn't revolting — it's just molting! And the population of these awesome beasts might be on the rise.
According to a U.S. Fish & Wildlife fact sheet: "Since horseshoe crabs have a hard shell, they must molt to grow. Horseshoe crabs will molt at least six times in their first year of life and about 18 times before they reach sexual maturity."
That's a lot of shed shells! I suppose we could ticket horseshoe crabs for littering, but that doesn't seem sporting. And now I don't feel bad about stepping on a shell — I may go back and crunch a few more.
Thus, this episode of Curious Cape Cod has a happy ending. I guess horseshoes are good luck!
What do you want to know about Cape Cod? To ask a Curious Cape Cod question, go to capecodtimes.com/curious-cape-cod and fill out the form!
The Link LonkOctober 11, 2020 at 02:07AM
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Curious Cape Cod: Cast-off horseshoe crab shells no cause for alarm - Cape Cod Times
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