World’s Largest Crayfish Found

Caitlin Bloomer, a lecturer in the Department of Natural Resources at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, once pulled a giant crayfish nicknamed “Crawzilla” from the mud during an expedition in Kentucky.

At the time, the researcher thought she had caught the largest specimen worthy of a world record. However, a colleague told her that he had seen even larger crayfish.

The friendly dispute eventually led to the idea of searching for the largest crayfish in North America.

The winner of the “giants’ competition” turned out to be a brush-tailed crayfish. It was caught in Tennessee in 2011 and later kept in the collection of West Liberty University in West Virginia.

Excluding its tail and large claws, the length of the carapace covering its cephalothorax reaches 86.6 millimeters.