Bob , Very Interesting. !We happened to be a few  of the birders who did rescue Horseshoe crab . See photos for proof . 
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3601/3542507486_acdcc829d6_b.jpg
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3625/3542507474_c8bb9b9c1f_b.jpg
--- On Fri, 5/29/09, Bob Mumford <> wrote:

> From: Bob Mumford <>
> Subject: [MDOSPREY] Horseshoe Crabs (slightly off topic)
> To: 
> Date: Friday, May 29, 2009, 11:50 AM
> Like Harry Armistead and others, I
> was over at Slaughter Beach, DE, on
> Wednesday and noted the large numbers of stranded horseshoe
> crabs.
> 
> I got to thinking: we birders have been understandably very
> upset with the
> over-harvest of horseshoe crabs and the effect of that take
> on egg
> production  and thus the survival of Red Knots. 
> Yet few people make any effort at
> all  to rescue overturned crabs to allow them to get
> back into the water or
> transport  crabs stranded in parking lots and other
> unsuitable locations.
> 
> Chris and I overturned about 50 crabs in ten minutes or so
> on Slaughter 
> Beach, but of the 25 or so birders I saw during the day, no
> one else did
> anything that I witnessed.
> 
> I have heard the argument that crabs have evolved over a
> million years or
> so and so have survived despite the losses due to
> overturning in the surf or
>  being stranded by extra high tides far from the water's
> edge.  But
> evolution occurred before there were roads, parking lots,
> rip rap, piers,
> breakwaters and all the other accouterments of
> civilization.
> 
> I wonder what the effect would be if every birder visiting
> the shores of
> Delaware Beach turned over or rescued just 25 crabs a
> day?  Helpful?
> Significant?  Enough to offset the losses to
> crabbers?
> 
> Bob Mumford
> Darnestown
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>