Maybe Huntington’s Dog Beach should be re-named Crab Beach?

Little red crab critters washed up along the water line – some dead, some still squirming around and pinching their claws – Wednesday afternoon near Goldenwest Street, up the coast to the Bolsa Chica Wetlands inlet in Huntington Beach.

Lifeguards estimated about 1,000 crabs washed up with the tide.

While they dotted the water line, it was still nowhere near the hundreds of thousands – if not millions – that landed last June and blanketed areas spanning the entire coastline.

Still, the red crabs were a shocking sight to beachgoers who came across them on their day out with their dogs.

“I got pinched by one,” said Katie Glover, who was visiting the area for the first time from L.A. “It was on my foot. We were walking, and my little Yorkie ran past it and cried. I think he got pinched by one first.”

The Pleuroncodes planipes, also known as pelagic red crabs or tuna crabs, look like tiny lobsters or crawfish and are about 1 to 3 inches long.

They are usually found off Baja, but because of El Niño conditions with currents pushing in from the south, the crabs have washed up in recent years along the Orange County coastline. The crabs hadn’t been seen in the area for decades before the past few years.

Last week, a handful washed up in Seal Beach. And just a few washed up in Newport on Wednesday.

Different beach agencies handled last year’s mass wash-up differently. Newport dispatched beach maintenance crews to scoop up hundreds of thousands of crabs and take them to the dump. Other beaches let the sea gulls and tides take care of them.

Thomas Flores, of West Covina, pointed out the crabs to his daughter Mia, Wednesday.

“You want to see the crab? Right there,” he said, pointing down.

“A crab!” the 2-year-old yelled.

Flores and girlfriend Jackie Doroteo were grossed out by the sight as they were trying to eat. “There’s a whole long line of them,” Flores said. “I think it’s kind of disgusting.”

But the crabs had dog trainer Jake McGee thinking about a meal. “What’s the deal, are they edible?” he asked. “Are they served at the restaurants here?”

In fact, the crabs have little meat for eating, and once dead have a wretched stench.

McGee tried to get the golden retrievers he was playing fetch with to check out the surprise visitors. But the dogs were focused on the tennis ball McGee was chucking into the ocean.

“They don’t care,” he said.