Hermit Crab Shell Market

Professor Sandra Gilchrist and her students have been labeling shells and leaving them out for hermit crabs on Cayos Cochinos for fourteen years. She leaves about 6,000 shells per year for land crabs and 4,000 for sea crabs. 

This year I did my part by labeling 50 shells and creating a small market in the woods by our rooms. Hermit crabs come to market to trade their old shells for new ones. My market has seven net sales of labeled shells in two days. The pictures show today's market, nicely ordered in the morning 

and in disarray in the evening after a day of hermit crabs shopping.