The partnerships between hermit crabs and sea anemones: an overview

Abstract

The hermit crab-sea anemone (HCA) partnership is a common facultative mutualism. The anemone protects its host from predators such as cephalopods and shell crushing crabs by its stinging cells. The crab provides the anemone with a hard substrate and increased access to oxygenated water and food and in some cases with protection from predators. These partnerships are extremely diverse and complex. This overview addresses issues related to formation of the associations, the early history of these partnerships, placement of anemones on the hermit crab shell, intra and interspecific competition amongst hermit crabs over sea anemones, costs and benefits for crab and anemone from being associated and the evolution of these partnerships based on molecular phylogenies using nuclear and mitochondrial markers.