Smithsonian Science
Harris mud crab study, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Mark Torchin, left, a marine biologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, and McGill University student Dominique Roche, collect specimens from a population of a North American Harris mud crab in the Panama Canal that has recently invaded both the West Coast of the United States and several European countries. This is the first report of an established population of this crab in the tropics and were found in a lake along the shore of the Miraflores Third Lock of the Panama Canal. In 1975 this lake was characterized by scientists as “a unique Pacific habitat which supports a mixed biota of Atlantic and Pacific organisms." Scientists are now trying to learn if the Harris mud crab is restricted to this lake or if it is more widespread in the tropics. (Photo by Marcos Guerra)
Harris mud crab study, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Mark Torchin, left, a marine biologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, and McGill University student Dominique Roche, collect specimens from a population of a North American Harris mud crab in the Panama Canal that has recently invaded both the West Coast of the United States and several European countries. This is the first report of an established population of this crab in the tropics and were found in a lake along the shore of the Miraflores Third Lock of the Panama Canal. In 1975 this lake was characterized by scientists as “a unique Pacific habitat which supports a mixed biota of Atlantic and Pacific organisms." Scientists are now trying to learn if the Harris mud crab is restricted to this lake or if it is more widespread in the tropics. (Photo by Marcos Guerra)