By Susan Milius
Hermit crabs don’t send text messages while scurrying, but human technology may be distracting them all the same.
When boat noise roared over a beach, the crabs weren’t as quick as usual to hide inside their shells to avoid a potential predator, says behavioral ecologist Daniel T. Blumstein of UCLA.
The boat roar may not be masking the sound of an approaching predator so much as distracting the crabs from looking out for danger, Blumstein and his students propose in an upcoming Biology Letters.