Leptuca terpsichores
Dancing Fiddler Crab
Type Description
Uca terpsichores Crane, J. (1941) Eastern Pacific Expeditions of the New York Zoological Society. XXVI. Crabs of the genus Uca from the west coast of Central America. Zoologica NY 26(3):145–208.
Taxonomy
Subfamily Gelasiminae → Supertribe Gelasimitae → Tribe Minucini → Genus Leptuca Common Names
Synonyms, Alternate Spellings, & Name Forms (Chronology )
Leptuca terpsichores Uca (Celuca) musica terpsichores Uca (Leptuca) terpsichores Uca (Minuca) terpsichores Uca musica terpsichore Uca musica terpsichores Uca terpsichores Size
Small Carapace Breadth: 8.6 mm ± 0.92 (sd), 95% range: 6.8–10.4 mm (Data )
Geographic Range
Eastern Pacific Realm: southern Guatemala to northern Peru
Purple fiddler crabs iNaturalist ; yellow circles with a question mark
Range map data derived from: Crane (1975)
Associated Field Guides
Pacific Coasts of Colombia, Ecuador, and Northern Peru Pacific Coasts of Costa Rica and Panama Pacific Coasts of El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua External Links
Encyclopedia of Life Wikipedia iNaturalist NCBI Taxonomy Browser/Genbank GBIF
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving 21 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving 34 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving 33 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving 40 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving by hood 24 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores waving 1:26 min., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores displaying, with quick grab and throw (~36 sec. into clip) 58 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores fighting 1:05 min., 352 × 240, MP4
Male Leptuca terpsichores fighting 18 sec., 352 × 240, MP4
Altevogt (1957) ,
Altevogt (1970) ,
Altevogt (1972) ,
Aspey (1978) ,
Barnwell & Szelistowski (1985) ,
Beinlich & von Hagen (2006) ,
Bergin (1981) ,
Bott (1954) ,
Bott (1973) ,
Brusca (1980) ,
Christy & Dennenmoser (2006) ,
Christy et al. (1996) ,
Christy et al. (2005) ,
Cortes-Carrasco & del Socorro Garcia-Madrigal (2013) ,
Crane (1941) ,
Crane (1943) ,
Crane (1944) ,
Crane (1947) ,
Crane (1957) ,
Crane (1966) ,
Crane (1975) ,
Doherty (1982) ,
Dumortier (1963) ,
Dunham & Gilchrist (1988) ,
Ghent & Zucker (1990) ,
Greenspan (1975) ,
Guinot-Dumortier & Dumortier (1960) ,
Harris et al. (1998) ,
Hartnoll (1988) ,
Hendrickx (1995) ,
Hendrickx (1995) ,
Hyatt (1973) ,
Hyatt (1975) ,
Kaufmann & Barnwell (1985) ,
Kerr et al. (2010) ,
Kim et al. (2006) ,
Kim et al. (2004) ,
Lemaitre & Alvarez León (1992) ,
Moscoso (2012) ,
Moscoso (2013) ,
Nabout et al. (2010) ,
Ng et al. (2008) ,
Peters (1955) ,
Powers (1975) ,
Powers & Bliss (1983) ,
Powers & Cole (1976) ,
Rosenberg (2000) ,
Rosenberg (2001) ,
Rosenberg (2002) ,
Rosenberg (2019) ,
Rosenberg (2020) ,
Salmon & Hyatt (1983) ,
Sastry (1983) ,
Schöne (1961) ,
Shih et al. (2016) ,
Skov & Hartnoll (2001) ,
Thurman et al. (2025) ,
von Hagen (1968) ,
von Hagen (1970) ,
von Hagen (1975) ,
von Prahl (1986) ,
Wada (1993) ,
Weis (2012) ,
Zucker (1972) ,
Zucker (1973) ,
Zucker (1974) ,
Zucker (1976) ,
Zucker (1977) ,
Zucker (1978) ,
Zucker (1980) ,
Zucker & Denny (1979)
indicate locations where this species is found according to the scientific record; blue fiddler crabs surrounded by a dashed circle 
indicate the same but for larger, general regions; green fiddler crabs 
indicate “research grade” observations imported from iNaturalist; yellow circles with a question mark 
indicate questionable records of this species from the scientific record; and red circles with an x 
indicate false or mistaken records from the scientific record.
