BBC - Science & Nature - Sea Life - Fact files: Velvet swimming crab

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26 November 2009
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Velvet swimming crab
Necora puber

The velvet swimming crab gets its name from the fine velvety texture of its carapace. The rear legs are flattened for swimming, but it is more typically found hiding in crevices.

Statistics
The carapace (shell) is up to 8cm in width.

Distribution
They are found from northern Norway to the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. They live on all British coasts and are native to parts of Africa.

Habitat
They live in the shallows of rocky shores below the low tide mark or under stones in rock pools.

Diet
Velvet swimming crabs attack and consume whatever they can, including smaller crabs.

Behaviour
They also have flattened paddle-like hind legs for swimming rapidly away from predators such as cuttlefish.

Reproduction
Mating occurs when the female's shell is soft, after a moult. The male often protects the female until her shell hardens. She then carries thousands of orange coloured, fertilised eggs under her body until they hatch, in late spring, as shrimp-like larvae called zoea.

The larvae moult several times before developing into young crabs.

Conservation status
The velvet swimming crab is not threatened.

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