The Answer for the May 25 Mystery is……

If you guessed Horseshoe Crab, you are correct!

This is one of our favorite creatures that lives in the Long Island Sound!

Did you know?

Horseshoe crabs are marine and brackish water arthropods of the family Limulidae.
Horseshoe crabs get their name because their arc shaped carapace, or exoskeleton, has been compared to the shape of a horse’s shoe.
Horseshoe crabs live primarily in and around shallow coastal waters on soft sandy or muddy bottoms.
Given their origin 450 million years ago, horseshoe crabs are considered living fossils.
The earliest horseshoe crab fossils are found in strata from the late Ordovician period, roughly 450 million years ago.
The Atlantic horseshoe crab has two small legs (chelicerae) for moving food into the mouth and five large pairs of legs for moving.
Females are about 20–30% larger than males
Horseshoe crabs use hemocyanin to carry oxygen through their blood. Because of the copper present in hemocyanin, their blood is blue.
In the Spring, Horseshoe crabs migrate to shallow water near the shore, the female digs a hole in the sand and lays her eggs while the male(s) fertilize them. The female can lay between 60,000 and 120,000 eggs in batches of a few thousand at a time.
Horseshoe crabs are more related to spiders, ticks, and mites, than they are to crabs. There are only four living species of horseshoe crabs today. Limulus polyphemusresides on the eastern coastline of North and Central America. (Project Limulus-Sacred Heart University Website)