MEXICO: According to a local resident, Holly Cantere, shocked drivers stopped in their tracks upon seeing the giant “coconut crab” sauntered down a main road in Hawaii.
Holly told told KHON-2 that “It just kept walking, like there was not a care in the world when it crossed the street. Everybody slowed down like it was a pedestrian.”
The crab is called a coconut crab because of its ability to crack open its favorite meal of coconuts with its massive and powerful claws – something people normally have to use machetes for.
According to news service UPI, the coconut crab is the world’s largest species of terrestrial hermit crab and the largest land-living arthropod. The one found in Hawaii is far from the largest of its type. It weighed only 4.8 pounds (2kg) and measured 6 inches across (40 cms.) But they can grow as big as 3ft wide (1m) and weigh up to 10 pounds (4.5kms.) They are also known to live for 60 years.
The species is so aggressive and rapacious that it will destroy cash trans in urban areas hunting for food. It has been known to eat birds and even cats and can be dangerous for young children. The Huffington Post says that some people have even speculated that the un-recovered remains of the aviation pioneer, Amelia Earhart, were eaten by coconut crabs after she crashed on the uninhabited Howland Island.
The crabs are native to islands in the Pacific and Indian oceans, but are rarely found in the US and Hawaii, which designates them as a dangerous invasive species, capable of doing great harm to the ecostructure. Since another hasn’t been spotted since 1989, officials thinks that the crab was probably brought in privately as a festive holiday treat, but escaped the table. They are known to be particularly tasty, if they have been feeding only on coconuts.
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