Similar story to the one I posted earlier, but this one is more indepth in certain areas…plus The Hoff Crab. lol.

UK scientists have found prodigious numbers of a new crab species on the Southern Ocean floor that they have dubbed “The Hoff” because of its excessively hairy chest.

The animal was discovered living around volcanic vents off South Georgia.

Great piles of the crabs were seen to come together.

The creature has still to be formally classified, hence the humorous nickname that honours the often bare-chested US actor David Hasselhoff.

It is, however, a type of yeti crab, said Professor Alex Rogers who led the research cruise that found the animal, and it will be given a formal scientific name in due course.

Yeti crabs were first identified in the southern Pacific and are recognised for their hairs, or setae, along their claws and limbs that they use to cultivate the bacteria which they then eat.

But the new species found around the vents that populate the East Scotia Ridge are slightly different in that they exhibit long setae on their ventral surface - on their undersides.

“Their nickname on the cruise ship was the ‘Hasselhoff crab’, which gives you some idea of what they look like,” explained Dr Rogers from Oxford University’s Department of Zoology.

“The crab occurs in staggering densities. It is just incredible to see these animals literally lying in heaps around the diffuse flow of these vents.

“In places, they reached as many as 600 individuals per square metre.”