For more information and more pictures, please follow this link to the Calfornia Department of Fish and Game's web page on Eriocheir sinensis . However, E . sinensis and E . Chinese mitten crabs spend the greatest proportion of their life in fresh water, and this seems to be of adaptive significance. Osmotic autoregulation is what allows these animals to compensate for moderate, irregular perturbations of NaCl homeostasis induced by food uptake, land visits, or during molting phases. The movement starts during the summer and usually the crabs reach puberty during the final stages of the journey, in brackish water of tidal estuaries.
Males are the first to arrive and mating starts as soon as the females reach the estuaries.
Mated females continue seaward as the eggs are spawned about 24 hours after mating and the substance that fixes the eggs to the abdominal limbs appear to harden at salinities above 26 ppt. Throughout the winter, the ovigerous females remain in deep waters while the eggs slowly develop. Collected near mouth of Mississippi River, new St. Bernard Parish Hwy. 46 intersection, Bay Gardene, near La. wildlife and fish camp, Louisiana. Specimen deposited in the University of Southwestern Louisiana Museum Zoological Collection, USLZ 3684.