Crabrawler (Crabominable)
Overview
When measured from base to peak, Mt. Lanakila is the largest mountain on Earth. It is also the only mountains with year-round snow cover in Oceania, courtesy of the ninetales that call it home. This unique environment—a tall, frozen mountain in the middle of tropical lowland—provides a home for many species not found elsewhere in Alola, as well as two species and two subspecies of pokémon that are not found anywhere else on Earth. Crabominable is uniquely adapted to the Lanakila ecosystem. They begin life as a small herbivorous species that hugs the warm shores before some move up to hunt in the perpetual cold.
Crabrawler are not particularly intelligent or affectionate. Evolution does little to fix these problems. They are powerful, easy to care for, and adjust well to captivity. At the end of a challenge, they can be taken to the nearest berry tree and released with little fanfare. For trainers who want a fighting-type powerhouse without a constant need to train or an expectation of lifelong friendship, crabrawler is as good a pokémon as any.
Physiology
Crabrawler are classified as pure fighting-types. Crabominable are dual ice- and fighting-types.
The hardened carapace of crabrawler is purple. They have four long, spindly legs with hook-like hairs at the end. Shortly after molting (see Evolution), crabrawler are light tan in color. Two of crabrawler's legs are shorter and have very large pincers at the end. Unlike other crustacean pokémon, these pincers are not primarily used for crushing objects. Instead, crabrawler punches things. Actual gripping attacks are rare and their crushing strength is unimpressive. Crabrawler have a long, sharp spine on top of their head. This makes them harder to attack from above.
The species has crude lungs instead of gills. They are unable to breathe in water after their planktonic stage (see Breeding).
Crabominable tend to be far bulkier than their preevolution. Their legs remain about the same total length, but are no longer spindly on their form. This makes crabominable rather slow. Thick, wooly hair covers crabominable's entire body, including their legs. The hook-like hairs used for climbing are replaced, as there are very few trees on Lanakila. The horn on top of their head is replaced by tufts of blond fur. When crabominable is buried, this fur resembles a lichen patch. Finally, crabominable have massive pincers that are no longer capable of gripping anything at all. They are spectacularly effective blunt instruments and crabominable can break even sandslash armor in a few solid hits. The pincers can be fired off in an explosive blast if needed, but this leaves the crabominable down a pincer and is rarely done in the wild.
Crabrawler grow up to one meter across and can weigh up to 20 kilograms. They typically live for eighty years in the wild. Crabominable can grow up to two meters across and weigh up to 100 kilograms. They can live for over a century.
Behavior
Crabrawler are primarily herbivorous. They climb up berry and coconut trees, get a solid grip on the with their legs, and then punch the trunk until the food they want falls down. In the case of coconuts, if the fruit is not shattered on impact the crabrawler will punch it until it bursts. Once the fruit has been cracked or splattered, crabrawler will lower their mouth to the ground and eat. Crabrawler don't care about picking up grass or sand alongside the berry flesh and juice; any minerals that aren't needed for shell growth will be harmlessly excreted.
They will fiercely defend any food they knock down, even taking on far stronger birds in defense of what is rightfully theirs. This extends to humans; if a berry has fallen from a tree near the coast, it's a good bet that taking it will trigger a crabrawler attack. Unless provoked or feeding, crabrawler are relatively calm and will seldom initiate hostilities. When attacked, crabrawler prefer to defend themselves with a barrage of quick, untrained punches. If this does not succeed, they will attempt trickery to make an escape (see Illness).
During low tides, crabrawler burrow into the sand on beaches and sleep. When the tide comes in, crabrawler leave their nests en masse to feed. A single beach can house hundreds or crabrawler. Despite living in close quarters, crabrawler are not particularly social creatures and only interact to fight over burrow or food territory or to mate.
Crabominable are primarily carnivorous. While they can eat plants in captivity (see Husbandry), they have never been observed eating any in the wild. Crabominable's ice-type attacks are the product of endothermic reactions inside of their gut. These attacks, along with their fur, keep crabominable warm in even the harshest of conditions. This allows them to hunt ice-type pokémon with relatively little risk of harm. Crabominable are primarily ambush predators that disguise themselves as a lichen before lashing out with one or two powerful hits. Alternatively, they will leave half a kill and bury themselves nearby to attract other carnivores. Sandslash, weavile, and snorunt are their primary prey. They may attack ninetales and vulpix, but this has never been observed. Video evidence suggests that crabominable have begun to hunt vanilluxe.
Outside of their feeding habits, very little is known about wild crabominable. The Alolan monarchs and Ula'Ula kahunas have historically prevented scientific studies on the mountain. Even after the construction of the Alolan Pokémon League, interference from ninetales and vanilluxe has made observations difficult.
Husbandry
Crabrawler spend almost all of their days buried or searching for food. This makes them very tolerant of pokéballs. So long as they are adequately fed, they are willing to spend almost all of their time in one. Net balls are preferable, although nest balls and regular pokéballs are also fine. They should be let out of their balls to eat, defecate, and explore for at least a half hour a day.
While exploring, crabrawler will often try to climb things. If something resembles a coconut or fruit, they may try to punch it until it breaks. Crabrawler almost universally believe that vases look like coconuts. Most believe the same about lamps and light bulbs.
Crabrawler cannot technically be housebroken, but they generally prefer to defecate on wood shavings, grass, mulch, or damp sand. If there is only one area around that fits, they will conduct their business there.
Crabrawler, but not crabominable, get stand-offish around birds. Type I fighting-types like hariyama, machamp, and lucario will often grow frustrated with crabrawler's refusal to discipline themselves or train in a martial art. Sometimes crabrawler will start fights with crawdaunt, araquanid, and ariados. Crabominable may view ice-type teammates as food and try to eat them. Conversely, they are very wary around canines.
Crabrawler should be fed a fruit-rich diet, with mice or small fish occasionally thrown in as treats. They will need water bowls to drink from. Because they lack gills and are relatively dense, crabrawler cannot swim nor walk along the bottom of a pool for long. All water dishes should be shallow.
Crabominable are primarily carnivorous in the wild, but they can be fed a fruit-heavy diet in captivity with few apparent side effects. They can drink water from dishes, but they prefer getting it from ice crystals or snow. Evolution makes them more curious, and they will appreciate a chance to hide in a box or buried under dirt or blankets while watching others go by. The trainer should always be at the ready to withdraw the crabominable if anything gets too close. Even the best trained crabominable will seldom pass up a tasty meal that walks right by them. Crabominable are very fond of back rubs; crabrawler are not. The same goes for cuddling with a known and trusted human.
Crabominable should either have an ice-specific pokéball or a cold place they can retreat to at least once a day. A crabominable kept in a blizzard ball will only need two to three hours a day outside of it.
Illness
Most crabs foam at the mouth as a means of regulating their internal salinity. Crabrawler don't have to worry about that, but they still foam. This is their means of producing relatively weak bubble attacks that can serve as a distraction for an escape. It can also intimidate predatory mammals away out of fear that their prey has rabies. Crabrawler are incapable of developing rabies. Foaming is a normal behavior and nothing that a veterinarian needs to be consulted about.
The overwhelming majority of legitimate health problems occur during molting. Very young crabrawler can shed their shell in favor of a new one once a week. For the first year of their life on land, crabrawler don't even bother to grow a hard shell between molts, instead moving between gastropod shells and other found objects. During molting, wild crabrawler burrow to a point just above the water table and stay there for several days until their new shell hardens. In captivity, crabrawler should be kept in one place and not withdrawn into their pokéball during the process. Ideally they should be given a dark, cramped safe place to hide in. Until the process is complete, crabrawler are soft and very vulnerable to injury. Wounds that ordinarily wouldn't be felt can be fatal in this state.
As they grow older, crabrawler molt less frequently but each molting gets more dangerous. Getting out of their shell and growing a new one is increasingly energy expensive, and eventually crabrawler can have a three week softshell period during which they will have to go out and hunt for food. In captivity this danger is somewhat alleviated.
Crabrawler never really stop growing, although their molting becomes less frequent as they age. They will eat everything they can, and well-fed crabrawler will grow (and die) faster. Trainers who don't intend to evolve their crabrawler should limit their pokémon to one-fifth of their body weight a day.
Crabominable don't usually molt unless their carapace is badly damaged. Their molts can take a month, during which they will almost certainly have to hunt to get enough nutrients to build the new carapace. Captive crabominable usually survive, but the process is best handled under inpatient veterinary care.
Evolution
There is a healthy amount of debate as to whether crabrawler should be classified as a second-stage pokémon. Their larval form is planktonic, and even after emerging from the water young crabrawler have very different behaviors than adult crabrawler (see Breeding). The official stance of the USDA at this point is that crabrawler is the first stage of a two-stage line, as tiny planktonic forms are not counted as proper evolutionary stages and juvenile crabrawler look very similar to adult crabrawler.
Crabrawler on Melemele, Akala, and Poni Island will almost never evolve. On Ula'Ula, crabrawler approaching adulthood will begin to migrate towards Mt. Lanakila. They will spend a few weeks foraging near the base, usually in Ula'Ula Meadow, before they begin their ascent. Evolution is triggered by a combination of cold and elevation. Stimulating it in a lab requires thinning the air as well as cooling it.
On top of the mountain, crabrawler will retreat into one of Lanakila's slightly warmer caves, tuck themselves into an isolated, dark corner, and begin to molt. They typically molt four times in rapid succession, growing larger with each stage. At the end of the final molt, the newly evolved crabominable will exit the caves and begin hunting.
Trainers who wish to evolve their crabrawler are best off going up Lanakila with their crabrawler usually out of its pokéball. At the top, the Pokémon League Center has an area devoted to evolving crabrawler. Trainers who completed their island challenge within the last year may use the facilities once free of charge.
Mt. Lanakila is the most dangerous location in Alola due to difficult weather and terrain, as well as an abundance of pokémon strong enough to deal with those obstacles. The mountain is currently infested with vanilluxe who go out of their way to kill vulnerable humans. Weavile won't hesitate to finish off a badly injured human or pokémon. Crabominable themselves can and will kill anything that gets too close to them. Ninetales will seldom kill a human outright, but they will stir up the weather to make further progress impossible and then escort the trainer down when they finally give in and decide to leave.
Even with marked paths, summitting Mt. Lanakila on foot is an incredibly dangerous endeavor. Only trainers who have completed an island challenge or otherwise earned the permission of all four kahunas are permitted to attempt it.
For whatever reason, crabrawler taken up the lift or flown up to the summit will not begin to evolve.
Battle
Neither crabrawler nor crabominable sees any use in professional battling. Both are strong, but they are relatively slow and undisciplined. Crabominable has modest bulk, but crabrawler is very frail. When options like machamp and hariyama exist, it's difficult to justify using crabominable. Theoretically the ice crab has a niche as a hail-team counter, but hail teams have never been common enough to dedicate an entire team slot to dealing with them.
Ice-types in general are rare in Alola, as most of them are restricted to the inhospitable Mt. Lanakila. Crabominable's main advantage over hariyama, machamp, and other Type I fighting-types is simply that they require almost nothing in the way of training. Put them in front of a target and they know what to do. While they are not as strong as a well-trained machamp or hariyama, they are stronger than either of the two untrained. They are also easier to train than other Type II fighting types such as passimian, bewear, pangoro, and primeape.
Most trainers on an island challenge will be using crabrawler, and not crabominable, until at least the Elite Four. While crabominable are bulky and powerful enough to hold up until the very end of the challenge, crabrawler start running into serious problems on the second island. By the end of the third they will be near deadweight. They can be taught some useful moves, such as thunder punch, power-up-punch, and rock-type attacks. But they will never hone their technique in the same way that Type I fighting types can, and their supporting movepool and willingness to use it are both limited.
Acquisition
Aside from the handful of cities and resorts that bother to try and keep them off the beaches, crabrawler can be found on almost all of Alola's shores. As the tide starts coming in, camp out near a berry or coconut tree near the coast. A crabrawler will probably come. They can be captured or purchased with a Class I license. Alolan shelters usually release crabrawler unless they are seriously injured; crabrawler adoptions are handled on a case by case basis.
After a quick proving battle and a few days with a steady provision of food, water, and shelter, crabrawler are usually bonded enough to listen to orders. It can take them a few days to make a connection between an attack and its name, and a few more to actually use the attack their trainer tells them to.
Crabominable capture is illegal due to a lack of information on how many exist in the wild and what impact recent disturbances on Mt. Lanakila have had on the species. They can be purchased with a Class II license.
Breeding
Crabrawler mate in late September. After the eggs are fertilized, females wade into the water and release their clutch before moving back onto land. The eggs hatch after one to two weeks into microscopic zooplankton. If the plankton approach a shore after a ninety day period, they will begin to grow and develop into crabrawler about the size of a grain of sand. The new crabrawler will swim towards the land. Once beached, it will begin to rapidly grow and develop lungs. They are typically thirty centimeters across within five months. Crabrawler do not reach their maximum size or reproductive maturity until they are at least thirty years old.
Crabominable do reproduce. Occasionally a female can be seen coming down to the surface, dozens of juveniles about twenty centimeters across clinging to her body. She deposits them and heads back up the mountain. At the time of deposit, the juveniles have a phenotype and genotype identical to their crabrawler-born peers. It is not known how crabrawler mate or raise young.
Crabmominable have never been successfully bred in captivity. While crabrawler have been, it is best left to biologists in laboratory settings.
Subspecies
There is one species of crabrawler that ranges from the southeastern coast of Africa to coastal India to northern Australia to Alola. They live anywhere in the Indo-Pacific with large fruit-bearing trees near the coast. There are no subspecies documented.
All crabrawler have the potential to evolve into crabominable. This has been shown with crabrawler from Madagascar and Australia transplanted to Ula'Ula. The crabs quickly understood what they needed to do and began to climb the mountain after a few weeks of gorging themselves. Mt. Lanakila is the only place with the right conditions (a permanently snow-capped mountain within five kilometers of a tropical coast) to trigger evolution.