What a large Arthropod you have

I just stumbled upon an insane image of a coconut crab raiding someone's trash. I immediately thought it was some internet hoax since rudimentary searches yielded only that single photo. However increased searches turned up that it is in fact a real beast. The largest of land arthropods, so named because they live in the tropics (mostly the Philippines) and roam around cracking open coconuts and small dogs and feasting on their insides. Not really small dogs. They can get to be 19inches in diameter, but knowing nature, probably have pushed past that in a few specimens over the years. They are much less afraid of humans than they generally are of them, and, apparently, have been known to raid people's garbage. Basically just giant bugs filling the open niche left by raccoons in the tropics.

Think that's gnarly however, and I'll turn your attention towards one of the biggest arthropods ever to have lived. Slimonia of the family Hibbertoperus. It was a species of water scorpion 5 feet in length. It lay in wait motionless in prehistoric UK bogs some 330 million years ago. It is believe that this is about the absolute physical limits of what an arthropod can grow to. Horrors yesterday and today. What a world.

National Geographic