Curacha Dancing Crabs

Curacha dancing crabs are a speciality of Zamboanga, at the extreme right hand bottom of the Philippines.

The first time I ate them, there, I found myself sitting at the next table to Nur Misuari, the politician then in charge of the Muslim provinces (ARMM) of Mindanao, and they were delicious (no, not the politician and his cronies, but the crabs).

Since then, of course, Muslims have gone very much out of fashion.

Nur Misuari's done a bit of jail time since, but then so should anyone who sets out to be a politician; a little bit of waterboarding wouldn't go amiss.

But we also have curachas here, in Siargao, where they are known as kanduyon or ladan.

They are good to eat, because almost all the useful stuff is in the main shell, so you don't need to fuss about too much.

They're called dancing crabs, because they sit upright in the water, on their back legs, and ponce about, like a bunch of poofs at a party.

Notice their claws; they're not a lot of use, being angled in the wrong way, quite against heavy usage. they merely use them for posing.

If these things were created, then the Great Creator made more than a few design mistakes. Thank God, He won't be held accountable.

But Thank God, He made them tasty. You can find some better photos than mine here.

Katambak

Katambak (the local name for sea bream) are various different kinds of Snappers.

This one (Sailfin Snapper - Symphoricthys spilurus) is not typical at all.

It has those long 'tails' from its dorsal fin and its anal fin.

Otherwise, it's quite tasty.

The fish already has a very nice camouflage pattern along its sides, like a not-very-good artist trying to paint waves, but it's got those long, functionally useless streamers from its fins.

When I look at an animal like this, I wonder why it did it. Why grow long tails from its fins? Sexual advertisement, or what ?

Perhaps it's a very good example of 'costly signalling', ie, that it can afford an extra bit of showing-off to attract a mate (think peacocks' tails).

Amimintiks Can See Round Light & 100,000 Colours

Update: 9 July 2008.

Original post here.

I've just learned that my tasty crustacean doesn't have quite the fastest movement of any animal (some ant can snap its jaws faster) but it is the only animal known to see Circular Polarised Light.

The story (I missed it when it came out in March) is at the Wired Science blog.

If you want to know what Circular Polarised Light is, then look at a related news story by the same writer, Brandon Keim, at Wired Science, where this photo came from.

Next time I get some, I'll look 'em right in the eyes before I cook ém.

Amimintik - Mantis Shrimp

Greg Laden's Blog has a fascinating film about the truly amazing speed that these 'shrimps' move, which is quite unbelievable - they would have put Mohammed Ali in the shade.
It's a fascinating film. We have 'amimintiks' here in the Philippines - they're the spearing species shown in the film. They are extremely fast, and their grabbing arms are lined with needle-sharp spines - very sharp - you can't even handle one without getting pricked.
When you're snorkelling, you can hear them underwater - sharp reports from time to time - not all their efforts result in anything very much.


I featured them in a tale about Sunday afternoon reef foraging (right at the end):
and I can confirm that they are very tasty indeed - like lobsters but at 1/10the price. Here, they catch the spearers with sprung nooses set just above their sand holes. A bit of springy bamboo, a bit of string, and some fishy bait is all that is needed.



.

At some time in each month, some of them come loaded with 'coral' - eggs, that are the most tasty part. But, unlike lobsters, crabs, etc, that grow their eggs under their bellies, amimintiks grow theirs under the shell of their backs, so they have to moult to give birth.
There's a small local estuary here that no-one will dare cross, because although it is shallow enough, it is full of amimintiks, and they've been known to kill carabaos - the local domesticated water buffalo.

In the two photos above, you can see the creature in full size (about 10" long), and the truly awful structure of its grabbing claws.

But they are very tasty

Oh! What a Lovely Neighbour!

Would you rent a used seaside cottage from this man?

He is my friendly and cooperative neighbour., the owner of Patrick's-On-The-Beach, which surrounds me on three sides.

We haven't spoken to each other in over two years, ever since I went round to introduce myself, and he told me that he was just about to take over the quiet garden of the house I had just rented from Dado, demolish my thatched barn that I was about to use as a bead-craft sweatshop, and leave me with just the mere concrete shell of a house that goes with those two invaluable assets.

Next day, I used the back gate from my garden, for a swim. It leads about 10 metres through the cottages that Andreas rents from my landlord, Dado, to the sea. I was confronted by this fellow, who told me he was concerned about security for his 'resort' - Patrick's On The Beach, and unless I kept the gate padlocked, he would padlock it himself.
If he did, I said, I would effing cut off the effing padlock.
Next day, he marched up my garden to my bead works, where the girls were working away industriously, accompanied by the town's Chief of Police, and accused me of 'threatening' him.
Nothing came of that, of course; it was typical bluster.
But that summer, while I was away in Spain flogging beads to punters in the local markets, he reinforced the closure by boarding up 'his' side of the gate.

More on the lovely Andreas in later posts, including the intriguing tale of the source of the above smug self-portrait.

By the way, if you feel like you would like to donate to his orphanage scam, send a blank cheque to:

Messenger Of Joy Foundation
14721 S. Biscayne River Drive
Miami, FL 33168
Tel (305) 687-4107
Fax (305) 769-9924
andreas@mojf.org

Starting Out

This weblog will be an irregular notebook about my life (and occasional thoughts) on a small Pacific island, at the far right hand side of the Philippines. You can see what the place looks like at my website:
http://www.coconutstudio.com/GENERALLUNAfinX.htm

I change my obsessions with the seasons, and my current one is number systems in the Austronesian languages, of all things. I've been working on it for about four months now.

I thought, originally, that my findings would upset the entire current paradigm about the history of the people around me (the Austronesians), who managed to settle all the South East Asian islands, including the Philippines (where I live), Indonesia, and then went on to Easter Island, Hawaii, New Zealand, and west to Madagascar, just off the coast of East Africa.

Of course, I was wrong, but not all that wrong.

The Austronesian migrations were the widest spread of a distinctive human culture and anguage before the European expansions following the Age of Exploration in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The people who undertook this quite amazing migration share that culture and language with my island neighbours. Some of that culture is good; some very good, and some bad. (For a bit of the bad, see: http://www.coconutstudio.com/fishing%20expedition.htm).

I'll be writing a little about bits of that culture and language from time to time in this weblog. It will include random jottings that don't merit a full web page.