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67-482: The coconut crab ( Birgus latro ) is a terrestrial species of giant hermit crab , and is also known as the robber crab or palm thief . It is the largest terrestrial arthropod known, with a weight of up to 4.1 kg (9 lb). The distance from the tip of one leg to the tip of another can be as wide as 1 m (3 ft 3 in). It is found on islands across the Indian and Pacific Oceans, as far east as

134-661: A ban on the capture of egg-bearing females in Guam and the Federated States of Micronesia . In the Northern Mariana Islands , hunting of non-egg-bearing adults above a carapace length of 76 mm (3 in) may take place in September, October, and November, and only under license. The bag limit is five coconut crabs on any given day, and 15 across the whole season. In Tuvalu , coconut crabs live on

201-517: A body length up to 40 cm (16 in), a weight up to 4.1 kg (9 lb), and a leg span more than 0.91 m (3 ft), with males generally being larger than females. The carapace may reach a length of 78 mm ( 3 + 1 ⁄ 16  in), and a width up to 200 mm (8 in). The body of the coconut crab is, like those of all decapods , divided into a front section ( cephalothorax ) with 10  legs , and an abdomen . The front-most pair of legs has large chelae (claws) with

268-417: A burrow, the crab has been filmed climbing coconut and pandanus trees. No film shows a crab selectively picking coconut fruit, though they might dislodge ripe fruit that otherwise would fall naturally. When a crab is not near its burrow, climbing is an immediate escape route from predators. Sea birds eat young crabs, and both humans and larger, older crabs eat crabs of all ages. Mating occurs on dry land, but

335-443: A few groups are carnivorous. Carnivorous gastropods usually feed on other gastropod species or on weak individuals of the same species; some feed on insect larvae or earthworms. Semi-terrestrial animals are macroscopic animals that rely on very moist environments to thrive, they may be considered a transitional point between true terrestrial animals and aquatic animals. Among vertebrates, amphibians have this characteristic relying on

402-434: A few months, they famously can enter suspended animation during dry or hostile conditions and survive for decades, which allows them to be ubiquitous in terrestrial environments despite needing water to grow and reproduce. Many microscopic crustacean groups like copepods and amphipods and seed shrimps are known to go dormant when dry and live in transient bodies of water too. This article incorporates CC-BY-2.0 text from

469-511: A moist environment and breathing through their moist skin while reproducing in water. Many other animal groups solely have terrestrial animals that live like this: land planarians , land ribbon worms , roundworms (nematodes), and land annelids (clitellates) who are very primitive and breathe through skin . Clitellates or terrestrial annelids demonstrate many unique terrestrial adaptations especially in their methods of reproduction, they tend towards being simpler than their marine relatives,

536-561: A preferable alternative to traditional fins in extremely shallow water), and lungs which existed in conjunction with gills, Tiktaalik and animals like it were able to establish a strong foothold on land by the end of the Devonian period. In the Carboniferous , tetrapods (losing their gills) became fully terrestrialized, allowing their expansion into most terrestrial niches, though later on some will return to being aquatic and conquer

603-510: A seashell of the right size often use broken coconut pieces. When they outgrow their shells, they develop a hardened abdomen. The coconut crab reaches sexual maturity around 5 years after hatching. They reach their maximum size only after 40–60 years. They grow remarkably slowly, and may take up to 120 years to reach full size, as posited by ecologist Michelle Drew of the Max Planck Institute. Coconut crabs live in

670-467: A tagging experiment, one coconut crab was observed killing and eating a Polynesian rat ( Rattus exulans ). In 2016, a large coconut crab was observed climbing a tree to disable and consume a red-footed booby on the Chagos Archipelago . The coconut crab can take a coconut from the ground and cut it to a husk nut, take it with its claw, climb up a tree 10 m (33 ft) high and drop

737-464: A unified clade ; rather, they are a polyphyletic group that share only the fact that they live on land. The transition from an aquatic to terrestrial life by various groups of animals has occurred independently and successfully many times. Most terrestrial lineages originated under a mild or tropical climate during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic , whereas few animals became fully terrestrial during

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804-475: Is a derived type of hermit crab , only juveniles use salvaged snail shells to protect their soft abdomens while adolescents sometimes use broken coconut shells for the same purpose. Unlike other hermit crabs, the adult coconut crabs do not carry shells but instead harden their abdominal terga by depositing chitin and calcium carbonate . Absent the physical constraint of living within another creature's shell B. latro grows much larger than its relatives in

871-399: Is an early aquatic form, either a nymph or larva . There are crab species that are completely aquatic, crab species that are amphibious, and crab species that are terrestrial. Fiddler crabs are called "semi-terrestrial" since they make burrows in the muddy substrate, to which they retreat during high tides. When the tide is out, fiddler crabs search the beach for food. The same is true in

938-519: Is due to physiological, behavioral, and morphological adaptations to water availability, as well as ionic and thermal balance. They are adapted to most of the habitats on Earth. The shell of a snail is constructed of calcium carbonate , but even in acidic soils one can find various species of shell-less slugs. Land-snails, such as Xerocrassa seetzeni and Sphincterochila boissieri , also live in deserts, where they must contend with heat and aridity. Terrestrial gastropods are primarily herbivores and only

1005-601: Is enhanced if a floating life support system avails itself to them. Examples of the systems that provide such opportunities include floating logs and rafts of marine or terrestrial vegetation. Similarly, floating coconuts can be a very significant part of the crab's dispersal options. Fossils of this crab date back to the Miocene . The coconut crab has been known to western scientists since the voyages of Francis Drake around 1580 and William Dampier around 1688. Based on an account by Georg Eberhard Rumphius (1705), who had called

1072-469: Is known as unga or kaveu , and in the Mariana Islands it is called ayuyu , and is sometimes associated with taotaomo'na because of the traditional belief that ancestral spirits can return in the form of animals such as the coconut crab. A popular internet meme suggests that Amelia Earhart crash-landed on Nikumaroro and her remains were rapidly consumed by coconut crabs on

1139-433: Is moist or raining, since these conditions allow them to breathe more easily. They live almost exclusively on land, returning to the sea only to release their eggs; on Christmas Island , for instance, B. latro is abundant 6 km ( 3 + 1 ⁄ 2  mi) from the sea. Adult coconut crabs have no known predators apart from other coconut crabs and humans. Its large size and the quality of its meat means that

1206-457: Is often obscure and becomes a matter of judgment. Many animals considered terrestrial have a life-cycle that is partly dependent on being in water. Penguins , seals , and walruses sleep on land and feed in the ocean, yet they are all considered terrestrial. Many insects, e.g. mosquitos , and all terrestrial crabs , as well as other clades, have an aquatic life cycle stage: their eggs need to be laid in and to hatch in water; after hatching, there

1273-718: Is one of the few groups that have evolved fully terrestrial taxa during the late Cenozoic in the Japanese Archipelago only. Shifts from aquatic to terrestrial life occurred at least twice within two Japanese endemic lineages in Japanese Pomatiopsidae and it started in the Late Miocene . About one-third of gastropod species are terrestrial. In terrestrial habitats they are subjected to daily and seasonal variation in temperature and water availability. Their success in colonizing different habitats

1340-414: Is one of the most significant adaptations of the coconut crab to its habitat . The branchiostegal lung contains a tissue similar to that found in gills, but suited to the absorption of oxygen from air, rather than water. This organ is expanded laterally and is evaginated to increase the surface area; located in the cephalothorax, it is optimally placed to reduce both the blood/gas diffusion distance and

1407-643: Is outnumbered there by more than 50 times by the Christmas Island red crab ( Gecarcoidea natalis ). Other Indian Ocean populations exist on the Seychelles , including Aldabra and Cosmoledo , but the coconut crab is extinct on the central islands. Coconut crabs occur on several of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal . They occur on most of the islands, and the northern atolls , of

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1474-456: Is very small and is used by females to tend their eggs and by the males in mating. This last pair of legs is usually held in the cavity containing the breathing organs, inside the carapace. Some difference in color occurs between individuals found on different islands, ranging from orange-red to purplish blue, In most regions, blue is the predominant color, but in some places such as the Seychelles most individuals are red. Although B. latro

1541-769: The Cenozoic . If internal parasites are excluded, free living species in terrestrial environments are represented by the following eleven phyla: Roundworms, gastrotrichs, tardigrades, rotifers and some smaller species of arthropods and annelids are microscopic animals that require a film of water to live in, and are therefore considered semi-terrestrial. Flatworms, ribbon worms, velvet worms and annelids all depend on more or less moist habitats. The three remaining phyla, arthropods, mollusks, and chordates, all contain species that have adapted totally to dry terrestrial environments, and which have no aquatic phase in their life cycles. Labeling an animal species "terrestrial" or "aquatic"

1608-631: The Chagos Archipelago . In the Pacific, the coconut crab's range became known gradually. Charles Darwin believed it was only found on "a single coral island north of the Society group ". The coconut crab is far more widespread, though it is not abundant on every Pacific island it inhabits. Large populations exist on the Cook Islands , especially Pukapuka , Suwarrow , Mangaia , Takutea , Mauke , Atiu , and Palmerston Island . These are close to

1675-489: The Early Devonian . Among arthropods, many microscopic crustacean groups like copepods and amphipods and seed shrimp can go dormant when dry and live in transient bodies of water. By approximately 375 million years ago the bony fish best adapted to life in shallow coastal/swampy waters (such as Tiktaalik roseae ). Thanks to relatively strong, muscular limbs (which were likely weight-bearing, thus making them

1742-492: The Gambier Islands , Pitcairn Islands and Caroline Island and as far west as Zanzibar . While its range broadly shadows the distribution of the coconut palm , the coconut crab has been extirpated from most areas with a significant human population such as mainland Australia and Madagascar . The coconut crab is the only species of the genus Birgus , and is related to the other terrestrial hermit crabs of

1809-537: The Indian Ocean and the central Pacific Ocean , with a distribution that closely matches that of the coconut palm . The western limit of the range of B. latro is Zanzibar , off the coast of Tanzania , while the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn mark the northern and southern limits, respectively, with very few populations in the subtropics , such as the Ryukyu Islands . Some evidence indicates

1876-760: The Nicobar Islands in India, on Flores Island in Indonesia, and among the Tao people of Taiwan. On the Nicobarian Kamorta Island , it is believed that eating the crab leads to bad luck and can cause severe, sometimes fatal, illnesses. In cases where a local falls ill after consuming the crab, their family creates a wooden replica of the creature. This effigy is then taken to the crab's capture site, where specific rituals are performed. While

1943-613: The Paleozoic or Mesozoic . Gastropods are especially unique due to several fully terrestrial and epifaunal lineages that evolved during the Cenozoic . Some members of rissooidean families Truncatellidae , Assimineidae , and Pomatiopsidae are considered to have colonized to land during the Cenozoic. Most truncatellid and assimineid snails amphibiously live in intertidal and supratidal zones from brackish water to pelagic areas. Terrestrial lineages likely evolved from such ancestors. The rissooidean gastropod family Pomatiopsidae

2010-750: The bristleworms , lacking many of the complex appendages the latter have. Velvet worms are prone to desiccation not due to breathing through their skin but due to their spiracles being inefficient at protecting from desiccation, like clitellates they demonstrate extensive terrestrial adaptations and differences from their marine relatives including live birth. Many animals live in terrestrial environments by thriving in transient often microscopic bodies of water and moisture, these include rotifers and gastrotrichs which lay resilient eggs capable of surviving years in dry environments, and some of which can go dormant themselves. Nematodes are usually microscopic with this lifestyle. Although eutardigrades only have lifespans of

2077-421: The larvae into the ocean. The coconut crab takes a large risk while laying the eggs, because coconut crabs cannot swim: If a coconut crab falls into the water or is swept away, its weight makes it difficult, or impossible, for it to swim back to dry land. The egg laying usually takes place on rocky shores at dusk, especially when this coincides with high tide . The empty egg cases remain on the female's body after

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2144-577: The mollusca . Many hundreds of gastropod genera and species live in intermediate situations, such as for example, Truncatella . Some gastropods with gills live on land, and others with a lung live in the water. As well as the purely terrestrial and the purely aquatic animals, there are many borderline species. There are no universally accepted criteria for deciding how to label these species, thus some assignments are disputed. Fossil evidence has shown that sea creatures, likely arthropods, first began to make forays onto land around 530 million years ago, in

2211-518: The motu ( islets ) in the Funafuti Conservation Area , a marine conservation area covering 33 km (12.74 mi) of reef, lagoon and motu on the western side of Funafuti atoll. Terrestrial animal Alternatively, terrestrial is used to describe animals that live on the ground, as opposed to arboreal animals that live in trees. The term "terrestrial" is typically applied to species that live primarily on or in

2278-406: The pith of fallen trees, but they will eat carrion and other organic matter opportunistically. Anything left unattended on the ground is a potential source of food, which they will investigate and may carry away – thereby getting the alternative name of "robber crab". The species is popularly associated with the coconut palm, yet coconuts are not a significant part of its diet. Although it lives in

2345-408: The pith of fallen trees. However, as they are omnivores , they will consume other organic materials such as tortoise hatchlings and dead animals, including other crustaceans, as well as the molted exoskeletons of other crustaceans. They have been observed to prey upon crabs such as Gecarcoidea natalis and Discoplax hirtipes , as well as scavenge on the carcasses of other coconut crabs. During

2412-573: The Early Cambrian . There is little reason to believe, however, that animals first began living reliably on land around that time. A more likely hypothesis is that these early arthropods' motivation for venturing onto dry land was to mate (as modern horseshoe crabs do) or to lay eggs out of the reach of predators. Three groups of arthropods had independently adapted to land by the end of the Cambrian: myriapods , hexapods and arachnids . By

2479-701: The air also. Gastropod mollusks are one of the most successful animals that have diversified in the fully terrestrial habitat. They have evolved terrestrial taxa in more than nine lineages. They are commonly referred to as land snails and slugs . Terrestrial invasion of gastropod mollusks has occurred in Neritopsina , Cyclophoroidea , Littorinoidea , Rissooidea , Ellobioidea , Onchidioidea , Veronicelloidea , Succineoidea , and Stylommatophora , and in particular, each of Neritopsina, Rissooidea and Ellobioidea has likely achieved land invasion more than once. Most terrestrialization events have occurred during

2546-503: The animal " Cancer crumenatus ", Carl Linnaeus (1767) named the species Cancer latro , from the Latin latro , meaning "robber". The genus Birgus was erected in 1816 by William Elford Leach , containing only Linnaeus' Cancer latro , which was thus renamed Birgus latro . Birgus is classified in the family Coenobitidae , alongside one other genus, Coenobita , which contains terrestrial hermit crabs. Common names for

2613-423: The branchiostegal lung, the coconut crab has an additional rudimentary set of gills. Although these gills are comparable in number to aquatic species from the families Paguridae and Diogenidae , they are reduced in size and have comparatively less surface area. The coconut crab has a well-developed sense of smell, which it uses to locate its food. The process of smelling works very differently depending on whether

2680-424: The coconut crab is extensively hunted and is very rare on islands with a human population. The coconut crab is eaten as a delicacy – and regarded as an aphrodisiac – on various islands, and intensive hunting has threatened the species' survival in some areas. In other regions, there are taboos associated with the crab that prohibit or limit hunting and consumption of Birgus latro . Such taboos have been recorded in

2747-411: The coconut crab itself is not innately poisonous , it may become so depending on its diet, and cases of coconut crab poisoning have occurred. For instance, consumption of the sea mango ( Cerbera manghas ) by the coconut crab may make the coconut crab toxic due to the presence of cardiac cardenolides . The pincers of the coconut crab are powerful enough to cause noticeable pain to a human; furthermore,

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2814-468: The coconut crab often keeps its hold for extended periods of time. Thomas Hale Streets reports a trick used by Micronesians of the Line Islands to get a coconut crab to loosen its grip: "It may be interesting to know that in such a dilemma a gentle titillation of the under soft parts of the body with any light material will cause the crab to loosen its hold." In the Cook Islands , the coconut crab

2881-536: The coconut crab once lived on the mainland of Australia, Madagascar, Rodrigues , Easter Island , Tokelau , the Marquesas islands, and possibly India , but is now extirpated in those areas. As they cannot swim as adults, coconut crabs must have colonised the islands as planktonic larvae. Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean has the largest and densest population of coconut crabs in the world, although it

2948-425: The coconut crab originate from different clades, the same need to track smells in the air led to convergent evolution of similar organs. Coconut crabs flick their antennae as insects do to enhance their reception. Their sense of smell can detect interesting odors over large distances. The smells of rotting meat, bananas, and coconuts, all potential food sources, catch their attention especially. The olfactory system in

3015-416: The coconut crab's brain is well-developed compared to other areas of the brain. Coconut crabs mate frequently and quickly on dry land in the period from May to September, especially between early June and late August. Males have spermatophores and deposit a mass of spermatophores on the abdomens of females; the oviducts opens at the base of the third pereiopods , and fertilisation is thought to occur on

3082-420: The coconut husk which the animal uses as bedding. While resting in its burrow, the coconut crab closes the entrances with one of its claws to create the moist microclimate within the burrow, which is necessary for the functioning of its breathing organs. In areas with a large coconut crab population, some may come out during the day, perhaps to gain an advantage in the search for food. Other times, they emerge if it

3149-423: The coconuts. As late as the 1970s there were doubts about the crab's ability to open coconuts. In the 1980s, Holger Rumpf was able to confirm Streets' report, observing and studying how they open coconuts in the wild. The animal has developed a special technique to do so; if the coconut is still covered with husk, it will use its claws to rip off strips, always starting from the side with the three germination pores,

3216-516: The eastern limit of its range, as are the Line Islands of Kiribati , where the coconut crab is especially frequent on Teraina (Washington Island), with its abundant coconut palm forest. The Gambier Islands mark the species' eastern limit. The diet of coconut crabs consists primarily of fleshy fruits (particularly Ochrosia ackeringae , Arenga listeri , Pandanus elatus , P. christmatensis ); nuts ( Aleurites moluccanus ), drupes ( Cocos nucifera ) and seeds ( Annona reticulata ); and

3283-413: The external surface of the abdomen, as the eggs pass through the spermatophore mass. The extrusion of eggs occurs on land in crevices or burrows near the shore. The female lays her eggs shortly after mating and glues them to the underside of her abdomen, carrying the fertilised eggs underneath her body for a few months. At the time of hatching, the female coconut crab migrates to the seashore and releases

3350-421: The family Coenobitidae. Despite being the product of carcinization , like most true crabs B. latro bends its tail beneath its body for protection. The hardened abdomen protects the coconut crab and reduces water loss on land, but must be periodically moulted . Adults moult annually, digging a burrow up to 1 m (3 ft 3 in) long in which to hide while their soft shell hardens. Depending on

3417-465: The females return to the edge of the sea to release their fertilized eggs, and then retreat up the beach. The larvae that hatch are planktonic for 3–4 weeks, before settling to the sea floor, entering a gastropod shell and returning to dry land. Sexual maturity is reached after about 5 years, and the total lifespan may be over 60 years. In the 3–4 weeks that the larvae remain at sea, their chances of reaching another suitable location

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3484-673: The genus Coenobita . It shows a number of adaptations to life on land. Juvenile coconut crabs use empty gastropod shells for protection like other hermit crabs, but the adults develop a tough exoskeleton on their abdomens and stop carrying a shell. Coconut crabs have organs known as branchiostegal lungs , which they use for breathing instead of their vestigial gills . After the juvenile stage, they will drown if immersed in water for too long. They have an acute sense of smell which they use to find potential food sources, and which has developed convergently with that of insects . Adult coconut crabs feed primarily on fleshy fruits, nuts, seeds, and

3551-411: The glaucothoe stage of development, they settle to the bottom, find and wear a suitably sized gastropod shell, and migrate to the shoreline with other terrestrial hermit crabs. At that time, they sometimes visit dry land. Afterwards, they leave the ocean permanently and lose the ability to breathe in water. As with all hermit crabs, they change their shells as they grow. Young coconut crabs that cannot find

3618-550: The ground, in contrast to arboreal species, who live primarily in trees, even though the latter are actually a specialized subgroup of the terrestrial fauna. There are other less common terms that apply to specific subgroups of terrestrial animals: Terrestrial invasion is one of the most important events in the history of life . Terrestrial lineages evolved in several animal phyla , among which arthropods, vertebrates and mollusks are representatives of more successful groups of terrestrial animals. Terrestrial animals do not form

3685-442: The group of three small circles found on the outside of the coconut. Once the pores are visible, the coconut crab bangs its pincers on one of them until it breaks. Afterwards, it turns around and uses the smaller pincers on its other legs to pull out the white flesh of the coconut. Using their strong claws, larger individuals can even break the hard coconut into smaller pieces for easier consumption. Coconut crabs are considered one of

3752-420: The husk nut, to access the coconut flesh inside. They often descend from the trees by falling, and can survive a fall of at least 4.5 m (15 ft) unhurt. Coconut crabs cut holes into coconuts with their strong claws and eat the contents, although it can take several days before the coconut is opened. Thomas Hale Streets discussed the behaviour in 1877, doubting that the animal would climb trees to get at

3819-762: The island. However, as no evidence of Earhart's plane has been found on or near Nikumaroro, this theory is generally discredited by historians. Coconut crab populations in several areas have declined or become locally extinct due to both habitat loss and human predation. In 1981, it was listed on the IUCN Red List as a vulnerable species , but a lack of biological data caused its assessment to be amended to " data deficient " in 1996. In 2018, IUCN updated its assessment to "vulnerable". Conservation management strategies have been put in place in some regions, such as minimum legal size limit restrictions in Guam and Vanuatu , and

3886-409: The larvae have been released, and the female eats the egg cases within a few days. The larvae float in the pelagic zone of the ocean with other plankton for 3–4 weeks, during which a large number of them are eaten by predators. The larvae pass through three to five zoea stages before moulting into the postlarval glaucothoe stage; this process takes from 25 to 33 days. Upon reaching

3953-510: The late Ordovician , they may have fully terrestrialized. There are other groups of arthropods, all from malacostracan crustaceans, which independently became terrestrial at a later date: woodlice , sandhoppers , and terrestrial crabs . Additionally, the sister panarthropodan groups Onychophora (velvet worms) are also terrestrial, while the Eutardigrada are also adapted for land to some degree; both groups probably becoming so during

4020-486: The left being larger than the right. The next two pairs of legs, as with other hermit crabs, are large, powerful walking legs with pointed tips that allow coconut crabs to climb vertical or even overhanging surfaces. The fourth pair of legs is smaller, with tweezer -like chelae at the end allowing young coconut crabs to grip the inside of the shell or coconut husks that juveniles habitually carry for protection. Adults use this pair for walking and climbing. The last pair of legs

4087-460: The most terrestrial-adapted of the decapods, with most aspects of its life oriented to, and centered around such an existence; they will actually drown in sea water in less than a day. Coconut crabs live alone in burrows and rock crevices, depending on the local terrain. They dig their own burrows in sand or loose soil. During the day, the animal stays hidden to reduce water loss from heat. The coconut crabs' burrows contain very fine yet strong fibres of

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4154-479: The reference and CC-BY-2.5 text from the reference and CC-BY-3.0 text from the reference Coenobitidae The Coenobitidae are the family of terrestrial hermit crabs , widely known for their land-living habits as adults. They are found in coastal tropical regions around the world and require access to the ocean to breed. Although coenobitids are fully terrestrial as adults, they spend their marine life as planktonic larvae. Female coenobitids return to

4221-454: The return distance of oxygenated blood to the pericardium . Coconut crabs use their hindmost, smallest pair of legs to clean these breathing organs and to moisten them with water. The organs require water to properly function, and the coconut crab provides this by stroking its wet legs over the spongy tissues nearby. Coconut crabs may drink water from small puddles by transferring it from their chelipeds to their maxillipeds . In addition to

4288-401: The sea to hatch their eggs and their larvae develop through planktonic zoeal stages to a megalopa, in a similar way as the marine hermit crabs. Just like these species, after settlement, terrestrial hermit crabs megalopae recognize and co-opt gastropods shells, before migrating into the land and molting to the first crab stage. The 17 species are placed in two genera: This Anomura article

4355-420: The size of the individual 1–3 weeks are needed for the exoskeleton to harden. The animals remain in this burrow for 3–16 weeks, again depending on size. Except as larvae , coconut crabs cannot swim, and they drown if left in water for more than an hour. They use a special organ called a branchiostegal lung to breathe. This organ can be interpreted as a developmental stage between gills and lungs , and

4422-428: The smelled molecules are hydrophilic molecules in water or hydrophobic molecules in air. Crabs that live in water have specialized organs called aesthetascs on their antennae to determine both the intensity and the direction of a scent. Coconut crabs live on the land, so the aesthetascs on their antennae are shorter and blunter than those of other crabs and are more similar to those of insects . While insects and

4489-488: The species include coconut crab, robber crab, and palm thief, which mirrors the animal's name in other European languages ( e.g. German : Palmendieb ). In Japan (where the species lives on some of the country's southerly island chains), the species is typically referred to as yashigani ( ヤシガニ ) , meaning 'palm crab'. B. latro is both the largest living terrestrial arthropod and the largest living terrestrial invertebrate. Reports of its size vary, but most sources give

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