Crabbing

Today was my very first day of actual work for Save The Harbor/ Save The Bay. I went to the Children's museum where I had to face a fear of mine and had to actually hold crabs. Although I held one at orientation, I was terrified and could only hold it for a few seconds. But at the Children's museum I had to not look scared in front of the children in order for them to volunteer to hold the crabs themselves. All I was grabbing were the green crabs, which is mostly what we caught. But there was a spider crab that I only touched the top of because I was intimidated of its size compared to all the other crabs I held. I taught the kids how to tell the different between a male crab and a female crab. I also taught them how to tell what a green crab looks like and how to identify it. The kids could pretty much guess why the spider crab got its name since it looks sort of like a spider. I hope I get the chance to be able to see another spider crab so that I can be able to grab it without being scared so that the kids can gain enough confidence in order to be able to hold it themselves. Although I did not hold him I feel like I made a lot of progress with facing the fears of touching the harbor animals and I learned many things about crabs and the harbor in just my first day.