One of many fiddler type crabs (Uca spp.) found on the low-tide mud at Port Douglas in Queensland, Australia. These small colourful crustaceans with their tall stalked eyes emerge from their burrows as the tide goes out to feast on the surface biofilm of the sediments. The one in the video clip is shielding itself, and protecting its territory, with its large right claw while it daintily scoops up mud and food with its tiny left claw and pops it into its mouth. This specimen has a blue patterned carapace about an inch across (2 cm).
Jessica's Nature Blog 
What a well designed little creature and beautiful!
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Hi Jessica. Do crabs leave the little balls of sand arranged beautifully on the beach? I saw this in Queensland.
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Yes, they are wonderful little creatures, aren’t they, Claudia.
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Yes, some varieties of crab leave little balls of sand on the beach. They were very common on the Queensland beaches I visited and I have many pictures of the patterns they make. That is going to be my next post.
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Nicely filmed! 🙂 Yes, they have the big claw to fight rivals and protect their territory, look pretty comic, claws are almost as big as they themselves are.
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Thank you, John. They are so small that you could overlook them. The big claw must be so heavy but yet of great advantage to the male crabs and therefore worth all the energy spent.
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I look forward to seeing you post. I took some pictures of the patterns too. Quite fascinating.
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The post is now published. I noticed how different the patterns could look from place to place. I’ll do another post soon with something similar but a bit different, and the images include a fleeting glimpse of one of the crabs exiting the burrow.
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