From Australian Oceans Data Network
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The use of claw colour and pattern for species recognition in the fiddler crab Uca mjoebergi

Created 23/06/2025

Updated 23/06/2025

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In the fiddler crab Uca mjoebergi, males attract females to their burrows by waving their enlarged yellow claw. Colour is clearly involved in species recognition in U. mjoebergi, but the role of the species-specific colour pattern has not been investigated. Here we show that U. mjoebergi females preferentially approach uniformaly yellow claws over bicoloured, yellow and white, claws. This is not due to a preference for a larger yellow signal, as they fail to discriminate between bicoloured claws differing in the proportion of yellow. Claw colour and pattern appear to be equally important in the recognition of conspecific males, as females do not distinguish between a uniformly coloured claw of the wrong colour and a claw containing yellow in the wrong pattern. Experiments were conducted in October 2005, near the mangrove boardwalk in the East Point Reserve, Darwin, NT.

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Field Value
Title The use of claw colour and pattern for species recognition in the fiddler crab Uca mjoebergi
Language eng
Licence Not Specified
Landing Page https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/5d1ef245-2ad1-4a40-8cbb-4287457d9a3a
Contact Point
Australian Ocean Data Network
Tanya.Detto@hotmail.com
Reference Period 01/10/2005 - 01/10/2005
Geospatial Coverage
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors
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  "type": "Polygon"
}
Data Portal Australian Oceans Data Network

Data Source

This dataset was originally found on Australian Oceans Data Network "The use of claw colour and pattern for species recognition in the fiddler crab Uca mjoebergi". Please visit the source to access the original metadata of the dataset:
https://catalogue.aodn.org.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/csw/dataset/the-use-of-claw-colour-and-pattern-for-species-recognition-in-the-fiddler-crab-uca-mjoebergi1