British Isles naming dispute "British-Irish Isles" and the Islands of the North Atlantic. In documents drawn up jointly between the British and Irish governments, the archipelago is referred to simply as "these islands". To some, the dispute is partly semantic, and the term is a value-free geographic one, while, to others, it is a value-laden political one. The Crown dependencies of the Channel Islands may also for geo-political reasons be included in the British Isles, despite not being geographically part of the archipelago. United Kingdom law uses the term British Islands to refer to the UK, Channel Islands, and Isle of Man as a
Crabs of the British Isles Crabs of the British Isles Around 65 species of crab occur in the waters of the British Isles. All are marine, with the exception of the introduced Chinese mitten crab, "Eriocheir sinensis", which occurs in fresh and brackish water. They range in size from the deep-water species "Paromola cuvieri", which can reach a claw span of , to the pea crab, which is only wide and lives inside mussel shells. Several species of wild crab are the subject of crab fisheries around the coasts of the British Isles. The most important are the brown crab or edible crab, "Cancer pagurus"