if you scare easy don't look :) ID plz

[jero1]

What in the world is this?!!! It is about 1/2" long,made a nice 1/4" hole in the rock under a symphyllia to hide in...any ideas?

[msu spartan]

kinda looks like a tiny skull

i dont know what it is
never seen one b4

wierd

[jero1]

I know it scared the daylights out of my friend...lol never seen it befor myself...it is creapy

[LeslieH]

It's an oddball crab. It lives in holes and the dark black spots are probably re-inforced areas on the back that it used to block the hole against predators. Our crustacean curator was baffled by pictures of the same thing that someone else posted a couple of months ago. I don't suppose you'd like to send it to us for id?

[jero1]

I will see what I can do... I tried to couch it out with food for another look,but no luck.I'll work on it though. Those dark spots are eyes i believe...when we first saw it where it is in the pics it actually tried to climb up on my friends finger....
I saw the thread you posted about sending in crabs...use the same info to send it to?

[LeslieH]

Same info, yup. Jody (our curator) is currently doing a DNA study on relationships among coral gall crabs so it would be great if you could catch & send it.

[boomsticks]

Looks like a cinriolod or spelled something like that....its an isopod thing. I'm pretty sure they are parasitic to fish.

[LeslieH]

All isopods have 7 pairs of legs which are similar in appearance and 1 pair of uropods (tail fins); amphipods also have 7 pairs but the first two are usually modified for grasping food and they have several pairs of uropods. Although Jero's picture doesn't show all of them there are 5 pairs on his critter making it a crab.

there's another current RC thread on gall crabs here:
http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...e&pagenumber=1

[LeslieH]

Jero - found a paper for you which puts the crab into the genus Fizesereneia. I can't tell if it's one of the species mentioned in the paper but the black concavities are typical of the genus.

http://rmbr.nus.edu.sg/rbz/biblio/42/42rbz521-538.pdf

[tigereye37]

I think he looks like "The Punisher"............

[LeslieH]

A little bit more info. Roy Kropp, the fellow who wrote the paper I linked to previously, says your critter is probably Fizesereneia heimi.

[boomsticks]

Leslie, good eye! Didn't notice that or know that pods have 7 pairs neat! Learn something new everyday on this forum. I love this hobby.

Mike