Marine Life Cruises

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	Bay Scallop This swimming bivalve has 40 to 50 blue/silver eyes and only lives to be two to three years old.

	Black-tipped Mud Crab These are small crabs often found hiding inside old oyster shells. These crabs are small, but their black-tipped claws are very large.

	Blood Ark Unlike other mollusks, the blood ark has hemoglobin, which makes it look like it has blood.

	Calico Crab Its hind legs have been modified into large paddles that enable it to swim through the water column. It also has large pinching claws used to catch prey.

	Channeled Whelk This large snail is a predator on shellfish. It can pry open the two shells of a clam, for example, using the edge of its shell and its muscular foot. After opening the shell, it scrapes out the insides with its radula (tongue with "teeth").

Chiton
This ancient mollusk has eight overlapping shells instead of one.

	Eastern Oyster The Wellfleet oyster is world renowned for its taste. Many oyster eaters may not know that an oyster can change sex at any time during its life.

Flat-clawed Hermit Crab
This crab lives in deeper waters and is also called “Shield Hermit Crab” because of its large, flat, shield-like claws.

	Horseshoe Crab It is not a true crab, but it has copper-based blood like true crabs. Horseshoe crab blood is used to produce lysate, which is used in hospitals and bio-labs worldwide

Long-clawed Hermit Crab
This is the most common hermit crab in Atlantic waters. It is very choosy about which shell it chooses to live in.

Long-finned Squid
This mollusk is one of the most intelligent invertebrates in the ocean; it can communicate and remember, and its eyes can form color images.

Red-beard Sponge
This sponge is bright red when out of water, but looks brown underwater. It is made up of cells that carry out all the life functions almost independently of each other.

Spider Crab
This crab decorates itself with algae, barnacles, and shells for camouflage. Females could be carrying bright orange eggs in the spring and early summer.