Giant coconut crab attempts to steal clubs on Christmas Island golf course

A group of golfers were surprised that one of the world’s largest crabs joined them for a round and snapped one of their clubs ‘like a chainsaw’.

An enormous crab unexpectedly joined golfers for a round on Christmas Island and made off with some of their gear after slicing through one of their clubs “like a chainsaw”.

Footage taken on the course shows the huge crab clutching onto the ends of a man’s golf clubs after it appeared to have climbed up his golf bag.

Christmas Island local Paul Buhner, who filmed the video, which was shared to Reddit on Sunday, identified the thief as a coconut or “robber” crab.

Mr Buhner says in the clip the group had returned from putting out on their sixth hole to find the crab there.

“And that’s why we call them a robber crab … And we have not put this here, this has climbed up here while we’ve been putting out,” he says.

“He’s got a bloody good grip on it – look at that.”

Mr Buhner on Monday told NCA NewsWire that he had filmed the video in October 2020 and was surprised to find it doing the rounds on social media in January 2022 after his son sent the clip to a friend.

He said on that particular day he had an injured shoulder and was “just walking around having a beer” instead of playing.

“Friday golf is a religion on the island. Even if you can’t play you go out and support the boys and have a beer and that’s basically what I was doing,” he said.

“The originals are much funnier, but I understand the need to edit out some of the colourful language.”

Christmas Island, an Australian territory located in the Indian Ocean about 1500km west of the mainland, is famous for its endemic red crabs that blanket the streets during their annual migration.

But the island is also home to the coconut crab, the world’s largest terrestrial arthropod, which are colloquially known as robber crabs for having a penchant for stealing anything they can get their claws on.

The crab surprised a group of golfers on Christmas Island. Picture: Paul Buhner

One of the golfers unsuccessfully attempted to dislodge it. Picture: Paul Buhner

In the video, a man named Al pulls his clubs out of his bag and attempts to gently dislodge the crab without success.

“Al might lose a finger here, and that would be hilarious,” Mr Buhner says.

The crab is then filmed snapping the end off one of his friend’s clubs “like a chainsaw” with one of its large pincers.

At the end of the video, the crab is holding the covering from the end of one of the clubs despite the golfer’s best efforts.

Mr Buhner, still filming the daylight robbery, says: “You know what, just let him have it, mate. He’s won the victory – he’s beaten us.”

Mr Buhner said on Monday he had lived on the island for about 14 years while Al was a veteran of more than two decades.

“He’s been up there 20 years plus. Al will tell you he runs the show. Which makes it even funnier that this happened to him,” he told NCA NewsWire.

“We think there was some old fruit in Al’s golf bag.”

A Reddit user responded to the video to say they had lived on Christmas Island and claimed to have seen some coconut crabs that were larger than Jack Russell terriers.

“They really like coming out after dusk and can be like a bit of a horror scene sometimes when you're having a barbie and a swarm of them start coming in from the trees,” they said.

At their largest, coconut crabs can weigh more than 4kg and grow up to 1m in width from the tip of one leg to the tip of another.