Dungeness Crabs of Glacier Bay
Glacier Bay National Park & Preserve
Dungeness Crab Facts
- Dungeness crabs have purple tinged, grayishbrown backs with creamcolored undersides.
- Mature Dungeness crabs are typically 6"-7" across.
- Dungeness crabs have several pairs of appendages. Two pairs (antennae) are for touch and smell. A number of modified appendages act as a mouth, used for cutting, picking, sorting and pulverizing food.
- The pincers, the most recognizable appendage, are used for grasping, tearing and defense. Each crab has four pairs of walking legs. Appendages are also located on an uptucked tail; the female uses these appendages to hold onto her eggs.
- Crabs are able to regenerate lost appendages.
- A sideways walker, a crab will push with four legs on one side and pull with the other side.
- They are named after one of their representative habitats a shallow, sandy bay inside of Dungeness Spit on the south shore of the Straits of Juan de Fuca.
- Crabs have an outer shell, or exoskeleton, called a carapace.
- Dungeness crabs have broad, oval bodies covered by a hard chitinous shell.
- They have smaller, shorter legs in relation to their body size than other crabs of the area, and they have
