Human pressure can cause a decrease in the abundance of beach macrofauna, especially supralittoral crustaceans. In studying the life history traits of supralittoral crustaceans, human impact and beach features (e.g. beach slope, grain size, swash width) are often considered separately. Ghost crabs are widely accepted as ecological indicators of beach quality and condition since their abundance decreases at disturbed beaches; moreover, ghost crabs can respond to natural drivers. This study aims to determine factors affecting the density of the ghost crab Ocypode quadrata in the Mexican Caribbean. We studied the spatiotemporal variation of the density of ghost crabs at two urbanized and two reference beaches by counting crab burrows on all beaches during six sampling periods. Our results indicate that physical features of the beach are significantly correlated with burrow density, and burrow density varies substantially between urbanized and reference beaches. The greater variation of burrow density accounted for beach disturbance, followed by beach morphodynamic features. Based on these results, our study confirms that the ghost crab is a relevant biological indicator species and is useful for guiding beach management criteria in the Mexican Caribbean. Our findings demonstrate that temporal replications must be included when using ghost crabs as ecological indicators.

人为压力会导致海滩大型动物特别是腹上甲壳动物的数量减少。在研究上腹甲壳动物的生活史特征时，通常会单独考虑人类影响和海滩特征（例如海滩坡度，颗粒大小，斜流宽度）。鬼蟹被广泛接受为海滩质量和状况的生态指标，因为在受干扰的海滩上，螃蟹的数量减少了。此外，鬼蟹可以对自然驱动器做出反应。本研究旨在确定影响鬼蟹Ocypode quadrata密度的因素在墨西哥加勒比海。我们通过计算六个采样期间所有海滩上的螃蟹洞穴，研究了两个城市化海滩和两个参考海滩上的幽灵蟹密度的时空变化。我们的结果表明，海滩的物理特征与洞穴密度显着相关，并且城市化和参考海滩之间的洞穴密度差异很大。洞穴密度的较大变化是造成海滩扰动的原因，其次是海滩形态动力学特征。根据这些结果，我们的研究证实，幽灵蟹是一种相关的生物指示物，可用于指导墨西哥加勒比海的海滩管理标准。我们的发现表明，在使用鬼蟹作为生态指标时必须包括时间复制。