陸寄居蟹網絡日誌オカヤドカリブログ

In the Quirimba Archipelago of tropical northern Mozambique the small near-shore islands have wide intertidal zones, a large range of habitat types and an abundance and diversity of hermit crabs. Coenobita cavipes and C. rugosus are the most landward of 16 species of hermit crab which inhabit the intertidal region of the archipelago (Barnes 1997).Here C.cavipes occurs only in or close to mangrove forests and C. rugosus generally occurs on open areas of the supra-littoral such as beach or scrub vegetation, as has been described for more northerly East African population~(V annini 1976, Lewinsohn 1982). On Quirimba Island, the 2 species overlap on a stretch of coast, which has a thin veil of mangrove forest, and show both unusually extended periods of activity and distinct differences in activity with habitat type (Barnes 1997)