They can tear up larger pieces of food with those outsized claws, or chelipeds, and propel the smaller pieces to their mouths with smaller specialized appendages. Many live under rocks and debris on the bottoms of their aquatic homes, and they're omnivores, scavenging for living or dead plant and animal matter. Their muscular tails, as my friends and I well knew, are powerful enough to provide quick rearward escape. They have both short and long antennae that are highly sensitive to odors, compound eyes attached to stalks, and gills that must remain damp. Their legs have fracture plains along which they can be broken and, at the time of the next molt, regenerated. Introduced species have been problematic in many places worldwide, sometimes spreading diseases and out-competing or even extirpating native species.Ĭrayfish have segmented bodies with a joined head and thorax packaged in a hard exoskeleton. clarkii), brought in by the Natural Resources Conservation Service for aquaculture, for instance, is difficult to tell from P. Some have distinctive greenish-yellow to blue markings or colorings, but many are simply reddish-brown and can only be distinguished by microscopic examination of male individuals in certain phases of the breeding cycle. Species-level identification can be difficult. The life histories and distribution of many crayfish species in South Carolina remain a mystery, and new ones are still being discovered. The variable crayfish ( Cambarus latimanus) is probably most abundant in the piedmont, and the Eastern red swamp crayfish ( Procambarus troglodytes) is most common in the coastal plain. Some species exist in just a few streams or a single cave system, while others are fairly widespread, although no single species is found in every South Carolina county. All are members of the family Cambaridae, but they have adapted to any number of niches. The southeastern United States has the greatest number and variety of species in the world, and South Carolina has about forty, ranging in size from two to nearly six inches. There are more than six hundred species worldwide and three hundred in North America, and they can be found in most reasonably clean creeks, ponds, swamps and lakes - even sometimes in upland areas, where they burrow to find groundwater, leaving tell-tale mud chimneys. Freshwater crustaceans that look like tiny lobsters, to which they are related, they are famously served up in the Cajun cuisine of Louisiana, where they're harvested to the tune of one hundred million pounds a year. Viewing Tips: Look under rocks or debris in creeks.ĭepending on where you are, they may be called crayfish, crawfish (common in the South), crawdads or mudbugs. Young remain attached to her through two molts. Reproduction: Male transfers sperm to female, who stores it until the eggs are fertilized, externally, and attached to swimmerets. Forty different species are found in different areas of the state. Range and Habitat: Bodies of standing or flowing water. Range of colors, but most are reddish-brown. Procambarus troglodytes (species common to the coastal plain)ĭescription: Like tiny lobsters, two to six inches in length in South Carolina. Reproduction 101 was underway.Ĭambarus latimanus (species common to the piedmont) Finally it dawned on my seven-year-old brain that this was a mother and her babies. How had I missed it? Then there was another, and another and another. I studied it for the longest time and eventually noticed a tiny one beside it. The water was clear, and when we put our hands in, the crayfish raised those claws like twin buckets on a backhoe, holding us at bay. One particular morning, we brought back a large one in a bucket and put it in an old tin washtub in the yard. Mostly we'd just inspect them, watching the four pairs of legs and those great pincers wave in agitation. Catching them was labor intensive, but we had nothing but time. One of those was lifting rocks in the cold, clear water of the creek, watching crayfish scurry amid the sediment they'd kicked up. We slogged all day through creeks and ponds, jumped over fallen tree trunks, chased frogs and polliwogs, made spears and hatchets, imitated bird calls, and did a thousand other things that helped us learn about the world around us.
They were an endless source of fascination in an idyllic childhood world of trails and tree houses, slingshots and pocketknives.
My first dose of the birds and the bees came from a crayfish. May/June 2012For Wildlife Watchers: Crayfish by Rob Simbeck, photograph by Phillip Jones