horseshoe crab
dr. dolittle | June 18, 2016
The blue blood of horseshoe crabs contains a special chemical limulus amebocyte lysate (LAL) that medical laboratories obtain from thousands of animals annually to detect bacterial infections in humans. The labs are only allowed to draw up to 30% of their blood once a year. Despite these precautions, researchers are becoming increasingly concerned that some animals may be injured during the process resulting in the death of animals after they are returned to the ocean. In fact, some researchers are pushing to add horseshoe crabs to the vulnerable list as populations decline in some countries…
grrlscientist | February 15, 2008tags: endangered species, red knot, Caladris canutus rufus, Delaware Bay, horseshoe crab, streaming video
This a streaming video about the shorebirds, the Red Knot, that migrate through Delaware Bay from South America. Red Knots stay in the bay for 10 days or so and feed on horseshoe crab eggs to fatten up for their long journey to their Arctic nesting grounds. In this streaming video, scientist trap and tag migratory shore birds to gather information about them. [7:04]
grrlscientist | February 7, 2008tags: birds, red knot, Calidris canutus rufus, ornithology, endangered species, conservation, streaming video
This Sunday, 10 February, at 8pm EST, the award-winning PBS series "Nature" will feature migratory shorebirds, the Red Knot, and the horseshoe crab. This program, Crash: A Tale of Two Species, examines the amazing relationship between these two threatened species.
The red knot migrates from the tip of South America to its breeding grounds in the Canadian Arctic, and stops off briefly at Delaware Bay. Here it relies almost completely on horseshoe crab eggs to refuel for the second…