Podophthalmus vigil

Podophthalmus vigil is a species of swimmer crab found in tropical areas of the Indo-Pacific Ocean, including Hawaii, Japan, South Africa, the Red Sea, Australia. In Australia the crab is found across the north from Exmouth to Moreton Bay. It is commonly known as the long-eyed swimmer crab stalk-eyed swimmer crab, red crab, or periscope crab. Like other swimmer crabs the last pair of legs have flattened ends to form paddles. Colors include a greenish brown carapace with possible red spots, claws and legs pale violet, rose red or dark red. The carapace is typically up to 100mm across, very broad at the front, narrow at the back with a spine on each side. There is a single tooth behind the spine. Males are larger than females and have more elongated limbs.

Podophthalmus vigil

SSR2000 · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
periscope crabPBDB
Sits inside
PodophthalmusPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Decapoda
Life habit
semi-infaunalPBDB, for Portunoidea
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Malacostraca
Vision
well-developedPBDB, for Malacostraca

Time the record covers

At most 3.6 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 3.6 Mya and 11.7 ka, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Pliocene — about 1 of 5 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 4 of 5 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 0 of 5 occurrences3.7–3.6 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences3.6–3.4 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.4–3.3 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.3–3.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.1–3.0 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.0–2.9 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.9–2.7 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.7–2.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.6–2.5 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences2.5–2.3 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences2.3–2.2 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences2.2–2.0 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences2.0–1.9 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.9–1.8 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.8–1.6 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.6–1.5 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.5–1.4 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.4–1.2 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.2–1.1 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.1–957 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences957 ka–820 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences820 ka–683 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences683 ka–547 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences547 ka–410 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences410 ka–273 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences273 ka–137 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences137 ka–0 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences4.1 Mya0 Mya

5 occurrences of Podophthalmus vigil on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

5 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

1 formation

Mandog — 7.07°N, 125.57°E

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The named rock units Podophthalmus vigil has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Podophthalmus vigil and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Podophthalmus vigil and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

30 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 4 sites for Podophthalmus vigil, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

5 references

Each of the 5 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Podophthalmus vigil

Credit
SSR2000
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Podophthalmus vigil was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itPodophthalmus through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Fabricius 1798)