Maureen: Hi, I’m Maureen from the National Postal Museum.
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Jimena: I’m Jimena from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute.
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Maureen: Welcome to Stamp Stories, where we explore topics that appear on postage stamps.
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Jimena: Today we’re going to learn about fiddler crabs.
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There are many fiddler crabs at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (called STRI for short), along with a lot of other animals. The Institute is part of the Smithsonian, but you can see from these pictures it is a bit different from the museums you might be familiar with.
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Most of the Smithsonian museums are located in Washington, DC. STRI is located in the country of Panama, to the south of the United States. It’s in the Panama Canal Zone.
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The Panama Canal Zone is a famous place in Central America where ships can cross between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
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I work at a part of STRI called the Punta Culebra Nature Center. We have so many different kinds of animals there representative of the tropical ecosystems in Panama.
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We have anteaters,
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sloths,
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endangered frogs,
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fish,
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and other ocean animals,
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There’s a beautiful beach called Crab Beach, that gets its name from the fantastic fiddler crabs that live there.
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These are all pictures of fiddler crabs. Do you see those large pincers? Fiddler crabs are known for having one claw that is much larger than the other.
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Their large claw is an adaptation they have. They wave their claws to communicate with each other. Can you wave your arm like a fiddler crab?
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There are about 100 species of fiddler crabs around the world, and 16 of those can be found in the United States.
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We have 30 different kinds in the country of Panama, and four of those species live here in Punta Culebra.
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This map shows what it would look like if you put the country of Panama inside the United States.
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Panama is so much smaller than the US, but it has a lot of biodiversity.
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Because we are in the tropics, we don’t have four seasons like the US does. We have two seasons: dry and rainy, and we have many plants and animals that are not found in the US.
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This is what makes it such a great place for Smithsonian scientists to do research.
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Maureen: Thanks for sharing all that information with us, Jimena!
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Let’s learn more about fiddler crabs by reading a children’s book inspired by STRI scientists’ research! This book is called Crandall the Curious Crab, written by John Christy and Robert Keddell, and illustrated by Michelle Seu.
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Crandall the Fiddler Crab liked to look out from his sand burrow in Singapore and imagine what the rest of the world was like. He saw the big ships going by and wondered: “Where would a mighty ocean ship take me?”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: The next morning, Curious Crandall found himself floating on a piece of wood next to the largest ship in the harbor! With a leap and grab, Crandall Crab hung on!
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Clinging to the anchor of the big ship was scary, but Crandall Crab was not alone. Barnacles were everywhere! Crandall called out, “Where are we going?” “Panama!” replied one big old barnacle. “Panama?!” said Crandall. “Great!”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: The next morning, the wise barnacle explained to Crandall: “Our ship is going to cross from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean through the Panama Canal. When we come to a beach named Crab Beach in a place called Punta Culebra you must jump, sink and scurry to shore.”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: When the time came, he jumped. After a great deal of scurrying, Crandall finally made it to the shore. Crandall was very tired, but his exhaustion didn’t last long...
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: When he looked, there was a human being right in front of him! He knew that humans often do things that are really bad for fiddler crabs, so Crandall began to scream: “Run for your lives!! It’s a human!!”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: The other crabs on the beach explained. “That is Dr. John Christy. He is a scientist who works for the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. He keeps grackles, our most dangerous predator bird, off the beach while he observes our behaviors.” Crandall was shocked! “Don’t you see he has a weapon with bird feet?”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Crandall’s new fiddler crab friend Carmen said, “Come with me, let’s take a closer look.” She led him closer to Dr. Christy. “Dr. Christy is very patient and tries to learn about how we get away from crab-eating grackles. He even invents things like that bird foot wheel to see how we respond to vibrations in the sand like those made by a grackle hunting us.”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Carmen led Crandall near a grackle and whispered, “This is a crab-eating shorebird that we must watch out for. Amazingly, as a female crab, I don’t usually become bird food because males like you warn us,” she said. “When you wave your large claw to signal danger the females know they should stay safely in their burrows.”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: That night in the burrow Carmen and Crandall talked about Singapore and then Panama. They discovered that they were both curious crabs indeed. She said, “Do you know, Crandall, one day I heard an oyster talking about a place called the Chesapeake Bay. Perhaps we could travel there together.”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Crandall could not believe what Carmen was saying. He began to shout, “YES! YES...LET’S GO TOGETHER! Together we can be curious, brave, and strong, and travel to our new beach on the Chesapeake Bay!”
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Crandall knew he could find a ship nearby and help Carmen grab on with him. “I know we'll be able to find fiddler crabs all around the world,” he thought. With a wave of his claw, and at just the right moment, they would scoot quickly down the beach and scurry to find a ship headed to some place exciting...maybe even the Chesapeake Bay.
Jimena: [Spanish]
Maureen: Do you think Crandall and Carmen ever made it to the Chesapeake Bay? They might find fiddler crabs there, just like they would in bodies of water all over the world! Fiddler crabs are one of thousands of species of crabs. Here are two kinds that are featured on postage stamps in the United States: a Pacific Rock Crab and a Northern Kelp Crab.
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Although the US stamps show different kinds of crab, there are stamps from all over the world that have fiddler crabs on them. Here are a few examples. You can see one from Taiwan, the British Virgin Islands, Tonga, and Mauritius.
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We learned from the book that grackles are a predator of fiddler crabs. Grackles are a type of blackbird. We can also find them on stamps! Here are three images of grackles, from Grenada, Nicaragua, and Cuba, which are all small countries in the same part of the world as Panama.
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As we mentioned before, one of the most famous places in Panama is the Panama Canal. Countries from all over the world rely on it to help move their ships quickly along their shipping routes. The Canal has been featured on stamps many times. The stamps you see here were issued by the Panama Canal Zone for use in Panama. One of them shows a map of the Canal, and the other shows a ship travelling through it. They both have the words “Canal Zone” stamped on them.
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Maureen: The United States has also issued many stamps celebrating the Panama Canal. The stamp on the left commemorates the opening of the Canal in 1914, and shows a large ship, like the kind Crandall the Crab travelled through the Canal on in the book we read! The stamp on the right commemorates the establishment of the Canal Zone Biological Area in 1923. This is where the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute is located, and it’s a really important place for scientific studies and citizen education.
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Jimena: It was fun to make a connection between STRI and postage stamps! What a great way to learn a little about the amazing biodiversity in Panama. And there’s so much more you can discover by visiting STRI’s website.
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Maureen: Thank you so much, Jimena, and thank you to our audience for joining us today. You can also learn more about animals on stamps, the Panama Canal, and so many other topics, by visiting the National Postal Museum’s website.
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We encourage you to just keep exploring!
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