Evening star., 1954-01-01
Cumbridn Aninoi 5
Relative Lives oduy
Horseshoe Crob Virtually
Unchanged Through Ages
By Thomos r. Henry

About the earliest animal on earth
which left any traces was the crablike
trilobite which lived on the bottoms Of
shallow waters at the start Of the Cam
brian geological period-approximately
500 million years ago..
It had q hard shell which left i'm
: -pressions in the bottom mud which aft
erwards hardened to rock. Despite these
records, however, there has been much
speculation as to the actual appear
ance and ways Of life of the creature.
Probably its nearest living relative is
the ferocious- looking creature Of the
Atlantic Coast, the horseshoe crab. It
is a mess Of contradictions, says bull
letin from Rutgers University, where
an intensive study Of the animal has
been undertaken by DR.. Carl N. Shuster.
"It isn't" says the report. crab at
all but closer relative Of spiders and
scorpions.
1T Is frightening sight at first
glance with its heavily armored shell.
sharp-pointed, Spearlike tail and six
pairs of clawed legs. But the feroci-
ous-looking tail cannot be thrust into
any one unless he blindly trips over 1t.
and the dozen claws are so perfectly
smooth and slender muscled that even
the biggest crab hardly could admin
lister good pinch.
"The Atlantic Coast from Maine to
Yucatan is one Of the two shorelines
on the globe where the horseshoe crab
is found. In prehistoric times it popu-
lated European waters. It is one Of
the few primitive animals on earth to
have come down from prehistoric times
relatively unchanged. Fossil remains
dating back more than 800 million
years are recognizable relatives of the
specimens that children readily poke
on beaches today. It has four eyes OF
two distinct types. It's blood is the
color of a beautiful blue summer sky"
While the physiology of the crea-
ture has been studied widely, the re-
port points out, little attention has
been devoted to its ways of life. It
is Of some economic importance be-
cause of its destruction of clam beds.
Ice worms are no figment of the
imagination.
The fact that the surface of a gla-
cier in the far north sometimes be-
comes covered with vast numbers of
tiny worms often has been reported by
Arctic explorers, and now the obServa-
ton seems beyond question, according
to bulletin in the Polar Record,
journal Of the Scott Polar Institute at
Cambridge University.
Even the variety can be identified,
mesenchytraeus solifrigens, according
to the record. The little creatures are
quite close relatives Of the earthworms.
They seem to crawl out of the ice.
They are creatures of darkness, ap-
pearing on the surface of snow in late
afternoon and retreating into the ice
again shortly after dawn. Apparently
they must flee sunlight.
The worms are believed to live on
algae in the snow which covers glacier
surfaces. Within the ice they generate
little body heat from their own
breathing. so that it is unlikely that
they ever are completely frozen.
If Antarctica ever warns up to the
point where any sort of agriculture can
be carried on it probably will be ex-
tremely fertile after its long, ice-bound
sleep.
That is the opinion of members Of
the British Falkland Islands Survey
who have set up greenhouse at their
camp on Tonington Island, using local
volcanic ash for soil. Plants grew with
remarkable rapidity during the brief
summer, according to the report of
E. w. Bingham who conducted the ex-
pertinent. Members of the party were
able to have constant supply of fresh
lettuce, radishes and watercress and
bouquets of remarkably fine pansies on
the table.
They found it necessary to provide
shade during part Of each day.