When we were visiting the little sandy island of Petit Tabac (scenes from Pirates of the Caribbean were filmed here) Austin and several of the other kids at the beach (two families from Norway and one from Australia/England) decided to build a "school" for the hermit crabs that they found crawling through the sand. The school was built of sand with high walls, tunnels and archways. They fortified the outer wall against the surf using large blocks of white sand stone.
There were a couple places where roots from some of the shore plants created a natural bridge from inside the school to the outside. The kids decided that if a crab was good enough to find this escape route and be able to navigate it then they wouldn't be re-captured and put back. Kind of like a graduation!
Austin noticed that most of the crabs preferred a specific, swirly shell type. The crabs didn't fight or eat each other but seemed to be helping each other escape by building pyramids of crabs where the last one would be able to climb high enough to escape over the wall.
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