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I promised more beach scenes, and here you are: a rather dynamic beach action photography. The crab in the picture was photographed on the Praia Lacacao. In the picture it may look as if it was running away from the water which was just about to swallow it. In the reality, these crabs feel really good under water. However there was another lethal danger awaiting them on the beach: tourists. When I spotted several of the crabs walking along the beach I just wanted to take a good photo of them but some tourists decided to capture one. I am not sure what was their intention, they were staying in an all-inclusive hotel, so they were certainly not hungry, but there was suddenly a group of 10-20 people with two German guys and one Indian lady who took this hunt very seriously, they tried to catch the crabs with their T-shirts, plastic food boxes etc. I was really worried about the crabs because judging from their appearance, their joints looked very easy to damage. I was really worried that by these attempts to catch a crab, the people may have hurt several of them by breaking their tiny legs. Luckily even though they spend at least 30 minutes hunting the crabs, they didn't succeed. Eventually crabs decided to leave the beach.

When we discussed it with my wife later, she told me that few days before, she read an article that coast guard in the UK had prevented over the long weekend numerous acts of cruelty against the sea animals. People were catching baby seals, pulling them out of the water to play with them. The coast guards mentioned that several times when they intervened, they have even experienced an aggressive behaviour towards them. Sometimes I am quite ashamed to be a human. Do we, as a species, deserve to survive? Maybe our beautiful planet Earth is better off without us?

I think this species of the crab is called Ocypode cursor, the tufted ghost crab.

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