They always come to the Delaware coast in the US in June to spawn when the tide is in.
Horseshoe crabs are critical to the safety of human vaccines because their blood contains cells that the biomedical industry uses to test vaccines – including the Covid-19 vaccine – to ensure they are not contaminated with bacteria. In order to drain their (blue-colored) blood, they are stabbed directly in the heart. Then they are released back into the sea. Science doesn’t care what happens to them. In Asia, following bleeding for medicine, they end up on the plate as a delicacy. Fishermen also use them as bait. In both medicine and fisheries, there are alternatives to the gruesome bleeding out or impaling of the creatures that have walked this earth for 450 million years.
Horseshoe crabs are now threatened with extinction.
After surviving the dinosaurs, the horseshoe crabs face their ultimate challenge: humans.
In Delaware, however, a new consciousness has awakened. One is proud of the rare, little-known living fossils.
Laurel Sullivan, education coordinator at the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control’s Coastal Programs: “It looks like the sand is moving, but she, the female animal, is under there , and all the males are there around them because they want to fertilize their eggs.”
Glenn Gauvry, President of the Ecological Research & Development Group: “I think they can do it and they will survive. Different test methods are being developed for medicine and the fishermen can use different baits. That way the animals are less standing negative pressure.”
Sullivan says, “They haven’t changed in 450 million years. They’re really lovable. There’s nothing regarding them to hurt us with, nothing threatening. They just live their lives.”
And that’s exactly what environmental and animal rights activists in Delaware want to enable living fossils to do.