Photo Friday - Mystery Marine Critter from Myrtle Beach - Family Vacation Experts

Myrtle Beach Vacation photo copyright Stephany Wiestling, all rights reserved

Anyone know what this creepy critter is? Here are some clues:

We found it on the beach in Myrtle Beach.
It’s about 2.5 inches long and about 1 inch diameter.
I’m really not sure which end is the head… I think it’s on the right.
It’s dead. It was dead when we found it.
It is some sort of crustacean.

Here are more angles:

We asked our lifeguard who promptly told us what it was, and his answer floored us!

Now, I put the question to you, dear readers, do you know what this is? Leave your answer in the comments below or on our Facebook page, and feel free to ask questions there, too. I wish I had some cool prize to offer to correct answers, but hopefully the satisfaction of being right will suffice. 😉

Comments

Sonja says
August 3, 2012 at 3:46 pm
Looks like what we used to call sand crabs in California!
- Stephany says
  August 5, 2012 at 7:58 am
  Yes, that’s what I thought it was, but the lifeguard told us it was a sand flea!! If that’s true, that thing was HUGE!!
  - Paul says
    August 17, 2012 at 12:32 pm
    Yep, that’s definitely a sand flea or sand crab. It’s just different names depending on what area you’re from. Here is some more info and pics:
    http://fishingdestinguide.com/baitSANDFLEAS.html
    Anyway, nice find, as he’s a big one at 2.5″ long. Biggest one I ever found was about an inch.
    - Stephany says
      August 21, 2012 at 10:47 am
      I’m just glad it was not alive when we found it. It kind of creeped us out. 🙂