Biology of the Land Crabs

Book excerpt: Interest in land crabs has burgeoned as biologists have increasingly focused on the evolution of terrestriality. Before the publication of this volume in 1988, there had been no single comprehensive source of information to serve biologists interested in the diverse aspects of terrestrial decapod crustacean. Biology of the Land Crabs was the first synthesis of recent and long-established findings on brachyuran and anomuran crustaceans that have evolved varying degrees of adaptation for life on land. Chapters by leading researchers take a coordinated evolutionary and comparative approach to systematics and evolution, ecology, behaviour, reproduction, growth and molting, ion and water balance, respiration and circulation, and energetics and locomotion. Each discusses how terrestrial species have become adapted from ancestral freshwater or marine forms. With its extensive bibliography and comprehensive index, including the natural history of nearly eighty species of brachyuran and anomuran crabs, Biology of the Land Crabs will continue to be an invaluable reference for researchers and advanced students.