This page links to photos of Brachyuran crabs we have seen during several trips to Indonesia, particularly the island of Bali. Many of our species remain unidentified and many names we provide are uncertain. Much of crab taxonomy depends upon close examination of the numerous appendages, something that is not easily done through in situ photographs of the living animal. We welcome corrections or suggestions at uwkwaj@yahoo.com. The Brachyurans constitute the larger of the two main groups of crabs. The other group. the Anomurans, consisting of hermit crabs, porcelain crabs and squat lobsters, are covered elsewhere on this site. Like the Anomurans, we show only a small sampling of the Brachyuran species known from Indonesia.
Measurements were not taken in the field and animals were not collected, so any sizes given are very rough eyeball estimates often based on distant memories, and are provided only as a general guideline of what to look for. Unless otherwise noted, our crab measurements are estimated widths of the carapace, not including the appendages, which may be much longer.
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These are the box crabs. They live in sandy areas, buried by day and often out on top of the sand at night. Powerful pincers are used to break up mollusk shells.
The rear pair of legs of dromiid crabs is situated so that they can be used to hold something over the crab's shell, often a sponge but sometimes tunicates, clumps of soft coral, algae or any other item that may help to shield the crab from predators. Because there are numerous species in the family and details of the crab are difficult to observe, most of our identifications are tentative.
Many of these IDs are highly uncertain, particularly among the Achaeus and Oncinopus species.
Swimming crabs.
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