some type of adult girl

tricktster:

so I’ve wanted one of these little dudes for a few years now, this is Ptychognathus barbatus, aka the freshwater pom pom crab, aka a tiny lil funny lil guy.

Curious to learn more about the freshwater pom pom crab? Same! Not really an option! Like, don’t bother to look it up on wikipedia, because the only reference on there is that the page has not yet been created. And yet, should you be so inclined to put a very very small crab in your very very small aquarium? There are a not-insignificant number of websites will ship one right to your door for roughly 18 bucks, even as they acknowledge that nobody has really bothered to study them yet, but that people think they’re neat!

Okay, I was exaggerating by acting like we don’t know ANYTHING about the freshwater pom pom crab, people have been keeping them in aquariums for a while now, and they’ve gathered some data. Specifically, we know that:

• they’re good in tropical tanks of 5 gals and up,
• they eat algae and detritus,
• they get about an inch at the absolute biggest if they stretch their leggys out real far but usually they’re somewhere between a standard issue and peanut m&m in size,
• they have lil hairs on their claws that look like pom poms,
• and most importantly we know that - unlike every single other freshwater crab species in the hobby - they not only do not try to eat or harm the other animals in the tank… they appear to be entirely unaware that there are any other animals in the tank. Even if one of those other animals is directly interacting with said pom pom crab, the crab will just not notice.

Now you know me. I love a vacant little dude that is entirely oblivious to what’s happening around him even when it is very literally touching his face. That is why I own Taako the axolotl. So a peaceful oblivious little crab that won’t fuck with my nano fish or shrimp, even the tiny babies? As a concept I am into it. But something has always held me back, as I explained to my blackworm hookup at my local fish store today.

“Hey, did you see we still have a freshwater pom pom crab in stock?” he asked. “Those guys are so cool, I wish I had a tank going where it wouldn’t get eaten immediately.”

“Yeah, I keep on thinking about getting one, it’s just like… my nano tank is pretty heavily planted so there’s a ton of places for one to hide, and I keep asking myself ‘can I really justify spending $18.00 on an extremely small crab that I will put in the tank and then never see again?’’ I replied. He shrugged.

“I dunno, can you?”

So naturally I have a pom pom crab now, and to my complete surprise and delight, it seems like my concerns were entirely unwarranted! Check it out:

If you look really closely behind the I’m so sorry I’m just fucking with you to make me feel a little better about spending $18 on an extremely small crab that is technically somewhere in there and that I will never see again.

(via oarfjsh)