The nation’s first underground passage for land crabs to safely cross a road has been completed in Pingtung County’s Jialeshuei (佳樂水), Kenting National Park officials said.
Every summer about 500 land crabs cross the road from coastal forests to lay eggs on the seashore. About 300 crabs were killed by cars every year, national park guide Ku Ching-fang (古清芳) said, adding that the Scandarma lintou, Metasesarma aubryi and Chiromantes dehaan are the most common land crabs in the area.
The high death toll is a serious issue for the national park that has worsened as tourism in the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春半島) grows, park officials said.
Photo: Tsai Tsung-hsien, Taipei Times
The underpass is a 100m-long trench under the two-lane road, covered by a metal grate and slippery plastic sides to discourage the crabs from climbing onto the road, park officials said.
It is thought that land crabs use moonlight to navigate during their nocturnal march to the sea, park officials said.
Additional obstacles to herd the crabs toward the passage are to be added from May to June, the peak laying season, park officials said.
The passage has been designed based on land crab behavior research, but much of the information is speculative, park officials said.
Monitoring of the passage and its effectiveness is to be ongoing so that more passages might be built in areas such as Hengchun Township and Banana Bay (香蕉灣).
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