Eclipse Cookbook

Colophon

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The animals on the cover of Eclipse Cookbook are pole shrimp (Macrobrachium rosenbergii). These crustaceans can be found in freshwater streams and waterholes as well as in the brackish water and estuaries of the Indo-Pacific region.

Shrimp are similar to crayfish, but their arms are long with fine claws. As with most arthropods, a pole shrimp has an exoskeleton; instead of muscles connected over a bony internal skeleton, its muscles attach underneath, on the rigid, calcium-impregnated carapace. Six long feelers covered with chemoreceptor cells allow the shrimp to detect the smell of food in the water. The pole shrimp continually uses these feelers to scrub itself, removing pieces of dirt that may affect its function.

Like all crustaceans, pole shrimp grow through molting. Before molting, they grow a new shell beneath their old one; this new carapace is soft and somewhat folded, something like an empty balloon. The new carapace inflates with water, splitting the old one at the weakened points. The old carapace splits in half, and the entire head section slides out of the old shell. A sharp flick of the tail leaves the old exoskeleton lying at the bottom of the sea.

Mary Anne Weeks Mayo was the production editor and proofreader, and ...