Last month, the U.S. media engaged in a bit of a kerfuffle over a particularly beefy lobster that had been pulled out of the ocean at the Bay of Fundy. At some 23 pounds and an estimated near-century of life on this planet, the king-size crustacean is a worthy subject of a perennial news cycle that manages to somehow focus on monstrously outsized shellfish. The Fundy lobster isn’t alone, and is one in a line of many other big buggy bastards from all over the world that have received attention by tipping the scales at 20 or 30 pounds or more. The reasons why knowledge of humongous lobsters eventually ends up being mass shared are because 1) it happens to be a slow news day, 2) photos with people alongside lobsters posed in forced perspective to make them look even larger are awesome, and 3) it’s damned impressive, considering the average lobster that makes it to Red Lobster’s Spectator Tanks of Inevitable Death is only two or three pounds, a fraction of the size of these animals.

This is great and all, but our planet is populated with entire species of crustaceans that reach strikingly, unexpectedly insane proportions as a part of their normal biology. Perhaps the most famous, and most recognizable of these is the Japanese spider crab (Macrocheira kaempferi), an unsettling, spindly, deep-sea demon that looks like the end result of the Slender Man impregnating a shrimp, and at their largest, can outweigh your samoyed and bear hug a Ford Focus.

“AHHH, what the hell! Sorry, sorry, sorry…I’ll make sure to knock next time!”

But there are other crustaceans slowly shambling about under the waves, along sandy beaches, or even in familiar rivers and streams that are strikingly massive, and get comparatively little attention, despite being some of the biggest, crustiest, clicky-clacky pinch-mongers around.

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