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St.Croix, USVI

There was story I’d heard concerning hermit crabs. On a night when ‘the moon is right,’ they congregate on a beach and have a shell party, leaving a pile of seashells behind. The purpose, I was told, was to exchange shells, which didn’t make sense…why would there be shells left over to make a pile if this were the case?

I have since had curious experience with hermit crabs. Once, I switched on the light near the bathroom, and found a small one scrambling away from the light. I corralled him, and saw that his shell was a plastic film-canister sized container. On the container was the symbol for radioactivity, and the message ‘HAZARDOUS MATERIAL.’ I wasn’t sure what to do, but before I could do whatever, he got through a hole in the wall and I never saw him again. Another I caught picking (presumably one pellet at a time) cat food from the cat’s bowl. I naively picked the little bastard up and carried him outside. While I was doing this, he snuck a pincher out and clipped a neat cleft through the tip of my left thumb, catching a portion of the nail. Needless to say I dropped him. After that, I caught another (the same one?), picked it up with gloves, and basically tossed him out the window, which was the preferred method of disposal afterwards.

Maybe a year later, while surveying property bordered by beach, a West Indian helper got my attention and pointed out a distinct pile of shells of all sizes and colors. Obviously fresh, i.e., not too affected by the surf, it was not quite 3 feet by 2 feet, and mounded 8 inches high.

“That’s what you were talking about.”

I’ve since wondered what the explanation could possibly be, something left those shells there, and it wasn’t the surf. There were no apparent footprints, by any creature, though high tide would have wiped those out. The selection wasn’t something easy to assemble, at least I can’t see how; and this place was well away from any human activity or structures. It didn’t seem a likely place for a shell collector to dump her seashells.

Assuming I’d seen the real thing; perhaps it was a mating technique, the crabs bring a shell to impress? Or a territorial thing. Or a truly social get-together. In doing some reading, there are a couple of things which might figure into the picture. They live in colonies that can be quite large, Wikipedia gives a number of them approaching the number of shells that were on the beach that day. And they ‘trade up,’ which is to say, the biggest outgrows his shell, and he gives it to the next biggest, so that goes until, well, I guess there’s one lonely shell left (on the beach?). That doesn’t work either. Perhaps a spring cleaning of the reef, or showing off their conquests. Anyway, I don’t know what caused that pile to be there, certainly makes one wonder.

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Picture a Cat

Picture a cat, all furry and fat
in silvery, half-moon light.

A cloud that is fog then cloud
passes by,
leaving trees and pin-pricks of white.

A scratch on the floor,
made near the door,
a hermit crab dragging it's shell.

Bird songs echo along
a fabric of sound in the night.

Off in the dark,
a scraping of bark
as things move around out of sight.

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Picture a Cat (2)

Picture a cat,
all furry and fat
in silvery-cloud moonlight.
A picturesque hill where
the trees are all still
is noisy fog in the night.
The stars are all scattered
windy leaves clatter
in trees forgetting tonight.