The Finnish Environment Institute is looking for sightings of a tiny invasive species, the mud crab. It is not a new species in Finland either, as the first sightings date back to 2009.
The Finnish Environment Institute (Syke) is looking for sightings of a tiny invasive species, the mud crab, that has appeared on the Finnish coast.
Introduced from North America in 2009, the crab has continued to spread in Finland, first to the Gulf of Finland, but also further up the Gulf of Bothnia. So far, the northernmost sightings have been made in the Rauma area.
– I’m sure it will turn up there at some point. It runs both north and east. So it is possible that in a few years it will also be found on the coast of Vaasa,” says Lehtiniemi.
The latest sightings of crayfish are from Kirkkonummi, Espoo and near Helsinki in late summer. The approximately two-centimeter-long species belonging to pocket crabs is also familiar from the waters of Åland.
The mud crab lives on shallow shores, where it burrows in the mud or seeks shelter among stones, algae and vegetation.
– We depend on citizen observations. There will be as many as people want and are able to report. That’s why it can’t be said that there definitely aren’t any on the coast of Vaasa. It may just be that they have not been reported or detected.
If you spot and catch a mud pocket crab, it should be boiled and composted, advises Maiju Lehtiniemi. Photos of the discovery can be sent to the environmental center.
At the height of Ostrobothnia, there are already observations of another alien species, the woolly scissor crab, which is about ten times larger. The northernmost sightings are from Perämeri in front of Kokkola.