Nothing brings me more joy in the universe than petty drama and funky little creatures, so imagine my euphoria upon discovering that there is a free to watch crab cam which delivers the best of both for your viewing pleasure.
That’s right, forget the woes and wails of toxic reality TV, for I raise you one better: a crab cam, where you can watch sneaky squids try to steal food, crabs shellfishly fighting octopuses over but a crumb of sustenance, and general chaos upon the ocean floor that absolutely trumps random people being mean to each other.
Kayak fisher and local genius Andy Burnell unwittingly gave me the non-toxic drama I crave by attaching a camera to crab bait on the ocean floor, around 1km from Henley Beach in Adelaide.
He told the ABC that he started recording the crabtics happening on the ocean floor because he was curious about what sort of shellnanigans creatures got up to when he was fishing. As he soon found out, it gets pretty wild down there.
“I’ve been surprised by all the different things I’ve picked up along the way; the other fish, and the squid and the octopus,” he said, referring to footage of a squid changing colours right in front of the camera.
“What amazed me was the grid pattern the squid displays as it first comes in.
“It’s got perfect squares all over it and then it turns a dark colour and starts going for the bait — it’s right in front of the camera as the crab’s trying to pincer it.”
Of course the crab had to pinch the squid, it was clearly threatened by her ability to yassify herself at will.
Burnell’s crab cam Facebook page has since gotten thousands of views, and there’s now a loyal community of sea stans that love watching whatever drama is unfolding at Bikini Bottom.
And yes, 500 of those views are just me.
