If you are looking for half term activities for children in London we suggest heading to the London Aquarium to see the new crustaceans that have arrived.
A ten strong team of aquarists from the SEA LIFE London Aquarium have recently welcomed a 15 new crustacean residents including a pair of gigantic but very delicate Japanese Spider Crabs and an army of small, brightly coloured but incredibly feisty Rainbow crabs.
Display Supervisor at The SEA LIFE London Aquarium, Lucy Buckley inspects a brightly coloured rainbow crab after its arrival in a specially created perspex container designed to protect the aquarists from its intensely sharp and painful pincers. An team of ten aquarists individually transported 15 of the famously feisty creatures into the attraction’s new CLAWS! Exhibition. When together the crabs co-exist in a peaceful colony but individually they can display extremely aggressive behaviour.
A SEA LIFE London Aquarium aquarist inspects a land hermit crab taking it’s first peek at its specially created new home in the brand new CLAWS! Exhibition, launching at the SEA LIFE London Aquarium on 16th February. The group of lucky crabs have a stunning beach themed new display, complete with ‘pool’ and spare shells for them to move into when they’ve grown out of their own.
A huge Japanese Spider Crab stretches its 1.5 metre long legs as it’s carefully lowered into its specially created home. The leggy crabs were each carefully carried in by their own dedicated duo of ‘minders’, specially trained to support each of their spidery limbs.
The team had to transport each Rainbow crab individually in specially created perspex containers to protect themselves from their extremely sharp and extremely painful pinchers. In contrast, specially training was required to carefully carry the enormous Japanese Spider Crabs into their displays; with 1.5 metre long limbs the creatures may look fearsome but they are extremely fragile.
Jamie Oliver, Aquarium Curator commented “We’re used to dealing with what people think are deadly creatures with a display of over 20 sharks, Piranhas and a Cuban croc here at the Aquarium, but looks can certainly be deceiving. Sometimes it’s the smallest creatures that can be the most fierce and these unassuming looking rainbow crab pack such a pinch with their pincers that we had to carefully plan their transfer here and ensure our team would be totally protected from a potentially severely painful nip. On the other hand our giant Japanese Spider Crabs look scary but they are extremely delicate and require the most gentle of touches.
Jamie Oliver, Curator at The SEA LIFE London Aquarium, inspects/measured up a tiny baby Armoured Shrimp.
The creatures will feature in a new exhibition, CLAWS bringing together a spectacular collection of the “B-movie monsters” of the marine world, also including hermit crabs, armoured shrimp and the humble blue lobster.
