An important aspect to crabbing is knowing the anatomy of the crab, this will help further differentiate between the male and female crabs, and as well provide great information with respect to cooking and eating the crabs. Referring to the picture below, male and female blue crabs have very distinctive features that make them significantly different from the other sex. The most noticeable is the apron of the crab, which is the plate on the underbelly of the crab. Females have a much larger and more circular apron for the purpose of holding their eggs during mating season, while males have a more long and narrow apron. There is also catchy saying used in Washington D.C. to differentiate based on the apron, males are the Washington Monument, and females are the Nations’s Capital. More often than not, the size of the crab is also a key way to distinguish males and females. Males are typically larger in overall size and also claw size, in order to fight over mates. Females are usually much smaller and have smaller claws, and also have a distinctive shade of red on the tip of their claws.
More on the overall anatomy, the blue crab is composed of five pairs of legs, one pair adapted as pinchers, three pairs for walking, and one pair in the back for swimming. They use this mobility to walk the bay floor and scavenge anything from clams, oysters, mussels, dead fish, and even smaller crustaceans. While the pinchers are their main defense mechanism, blue crabs are famously known for swimming sideways instead of forward due to their bodily structure, and can swim sideways at high speeds to avoid predators.
