Spider Crabs By Nick Fisher

Spider Crabs

By Nick Fisher

I’m afraid I have worrying news for you.

Spider crabs aren’t actually crabs at all. They are extraterrestrials from another planet, who have landed on Earth and have cunningly decided to use the sea as part of their clever disguise. Instead of falling out of the sky, or arriving in suspicious-looking, unidentified flying space craft, whose presence would immediately cause concern, they are instead attempting to invade the planet by using the unsuspecting vector of our commercial fishing fleet.

You may think I’m mad. You may point your sceptic’s finger, shake your head and say ‘that Nick Fisher’s been on the magic mushrooms again’. But, mark my words, these spider crabs are not of this world. You only have to look at them to see they were designed in another galaxy.

At this very moment, there are armies of spider crabs crawling across the sea bed, creeping towards the beaches where they intend to amass into one unified terrible force, and then invade the planet. No doubt their strategic offensives will focus on the cradles of political power:

Downing Street and the White House.

This cunning alien-crustacean plan of world domination would undoubtedly succeed. And Man would become just another forgotten chapter in world history, were it not for one terrible mistake that the spider crab invaders have made. In their search for a convincing form in which to sneak onto Earth, they made the tragic error of choosing a body, that is just sooo tasty.

Spider crabs are failing to take over the world because ever time they pop out of the sea to start their invasion, we eat them.

One of the things that convinces me of spider crabs’ extra terrestrial origins is the fact that it seems like they’ve only just arrived. I’ve been sea fishing since I was 5, and I’d never even heard of a spider crab until a few years ago, let alone seen one. Now it feels like I’m surrounded by them.

The south coast of England and the Channel Islands have been chosen as the preferred landing site for the spider crab invaders. At this time of the year, in early summer, the number of spider crabs that are caught increases exponentially, as the armies of these maja squinado move from the deep water of the Channel, to the warmer, shallow inshore water.

Spider crabs have long, powerful, articulated claws (not unlike a Martian spaceships) which they use very effectively to tweeze open small mussels, clams and to mince up tough starfish. They are very efficient predators, equipped to hunt in daylight or dark, when they’re even able to catch small fish taking shelter amongst rock ledges. At the same time, if there’s nothing alive for them to hunt, spider crabs are happy to scavenge and eat all forms of marine carrion.

The summer migrations to shallower, warmer water makes the spider crabs more devious which results in some rather astonishing behaviour. Divers all along the south coast have reported sightings of huge underwater gatherings of spider crabs, who congregate together in tightly packed mounds of writhing, scraping bodies.

These orgy-like mounds are the spider crab equivalent of the Glastonbury Festival. A time for them all to get frisky in a heap and make beautiful music together. Marine biologists aren’t exactly sure why the spider crabs congregate in these heaving heaps for short periods of time. It doesn’t seem to be directly related to any specific spawning needs. One theory is that the mounds, which feature a concentration of females at the centre are simply a means of protecting the females from predators, while their shells are soft after moulting.

Brown crabs and shore crabs require the female to moult her shell and be in a soft state in order for her to mate. Male brown crabs aren’t interested in women unless they are all soft and smooth, plucked and waxed. Similarly, the female doesn’t want to know about getting it on with her man unless she’s in this squidgy and receptive state. Spider crabs don’t care. Spider crabs will mate with enthusiasm even when both the male and females are hard-shelled and littered with more spikes and spines than a hedgehog in a piercing parlour. Another undisputed example of the spider crab’s other-worldly origins is the spooky ability of the female to reproduce, even when there are no males about. It’s true. Female spider crabs that have been kept in isolation, separated from any males, have been witnessed to give birth to as many as five consecutive broods, without any evidence of mating or egg fertilisation.

The current theory that marine scientists have come up with, to explain this bizarre ability to self-fertilise and reproduce is that the females are able to store male sperm in a special part of their body in order to use it later when there’s no blokes around. However, we know that the reason spider crabs behave to oddly and have these inexplicable, unearthly abilities to hunt, mate and reproduce is because they aren’t crabs at all, but in fact just invaders from a far away galaxy.

Basically the sooner people accept this little known fact, and start eating their way through these invaders, the better.

My favourite is spider crab pasta, when the space invaders’ boiled claws are cracked, the white succulent meat is extracted, mixed with a little brown meat from the body cavity and folded lightly into the soft, cooked, warm pasta and dusted with Parmesan cheese.

Eat an alien today. Please. Our galactic future may depend on it.