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Relative growth and size at sexual maturity in Halicarcinus cookii (Brachyura: Hymenosomatidae): why are some crabs precocious moulters?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2009

Colin L. McLay  and
Anneke M. Van den Brink
Colin L. McLay*
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Canterbury University, PB 4800, Christchurch, NZ
Anneke M. Van den Brink
Affiliation:
School of Biological Sciences, Canterbury University, PB 4800, Christchurch, NZ
*
Correspondence should be addressed to: C.L. McLay, School of Biological Sciences, Canterbury University, PB 4800, Christchurch, NZ email: colin.mclay@canterbury.ac.nz
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Abstract

The small intertidal New Zealand crab, Halicarcinus cookii undergoes a terminal pubertal moult, but this moult takes place over a wide range of pre-moult sizes. Relative growth of the abdomen width in immature females is positively allometric, but negatively allometric in mature females. Male abdomen growth is negatively allometric. Growth of the cheliped propodus in males is positively allometric, but in females it is negatively allometric or isometric. Overlap in the size-range of mature and pre-pubertal immature female H. cookii is 72% and in other hymenosomatids it can be as high as 87%. This overlap is probably the result of crabs having a variable number of pre-pubertal instars, but seasonal change in water temperature, with crabs moulting to a smaller final size during colder months and to a larger size during the warmer months is also possible. The net reproductive rate (Ro) of early and delayed moulters is compared and for H. cookii Ro e / Ro d = 1.0 so the size overlap is stable. Most hymenosomatids have determinate growth, but Hymenosoma orbiculare and Elamenopsis lineata continue to moult after maturity and have retained the ancestral link between moulting and mating.

Keywords

allometryrelative growthmaturationabdomen widthcheliped sizenumber of instarspubertal moult
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 89 , Issue 4 , June 2009 , pp. 743 - 752
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 2009

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