Off Vinalhaven, Me., where Walter Day goes lobstering, the lobster population is booming, for reasons only partly understood.
The Gulf of Maine has abundant lobsters, but farther south, off Massachusetts and Rhode Island, the population has crashed.
Posted on 08/09/2005 5:53:20 AM PDT by OESY
...The American lobster, Homarus americanus, seems to be thriving in the Gulf of Maine, where in recent record-breaking years fishermen have annually pulled 70 million pounds or more of lobster from their traps....
"The last 10 years have been banner years in Maine, with more lobsters landed than ever," said Linda Greenlaw, who fishes for lobsters from Isle au Haut (pronounced I'LL-oh-ho), at the mouth of Penobscot Bay. "Nobody can believe it." But even as fishermen applaud these catches, they are looking nervously to the south. Off Cape Cod, along coastal Rhode Island and in Long Island Sound, lobster populations that soared in the early 1990's had plunged by 2000 and have only slightly recovered. After seasons of pulling up almost empty traps, some lobster fishermen in the region have sold their boats and sought other work.
Those who remain "are nervous for the future," said Dennis Ingram, who has been fishing since the 1980's and whose lobster boat, the Blue Moon, is based here. Like other lobstermen in the region, Mr. Ingram is helping scientists and fishery experts in trying to assess and restore lobster stocks. Although things have improved a bit in the last few years, he said, "I want to know what's coming down the road, to plan my business."
There are many possible causes for this lobster crash, just as there are a number of competing theories to explain the abundance farther north. To try to sort things out, marine biologists and other scientists are assessing lobster larvae levels, tracking juvenile lobsters with underwater robot cameras, and tagging them with magnetic chips or banding them the way that ornithologists band birds. They are watching them fight and mate in laboratory tanks. They are even designing underwater reefs they hope will turn into attractive shelters for lobsters....
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Bush's fault.
Lobster are great but I personally prefer a pot of mud bugs.
It's not my fault. I haven't eaten lobster in probably 20 years because of the high price. Doesn't look like I'm likely to enjoy one any time soon either.
The lobster cam doesn't seem to be working.
http://www.thelobstercam.com/
In Colonial times, servants would include a clause in their work contracts that they would not have to eat lobster more than twice aweek. Lobsters littered the shores here in New England.
Wish I could afford to eat them more than once a year!!
First I flounder then I lobster..........
And I assume that these activities are all being paid for by the lobster industry, with no support from tax dollars? Oh well. A guy can dream, can't he?
More Lobsters is good, Yummy!
I buy one or two every weekend these days that my wife and I eat. Our local market, a mom and pop, has a tank of 2 to 6 pounders brought in by a local lobsterman for $6.99 a pound. The smaller ones are $7.99. Not long ago, we could buy as much as we wanted for $2.69 but then Las Vegas and Paris started to feature them on the menu. A lobsterman only makes decent money however if he can sell them directly and not through a broker, so here on the seacoast we do have an advantage with respect to price.
That's because they never had one of Mumma's Lobstah rolls!
The only solution to any lobster problem is a pot of melted butter.
For flavor and texture you cant beat the Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab. Give me a dish of Crab Imperial any day.
Lobster is highly over rated.
Amen ... the atmosphere surrounding a good crawfish boil is unbeatable .... cold beer, friends and mudbugs ... mmmm..... .
I agree with you about the Blue Crabs.........but don't underestimate the flavor of the lobster caught off the coast of Delaware and Ocean City, MD..................puts Maine lobster to shame :)
I'm with you on the pot of mud bugs. Along with that pot of crawdaddies, a six-pack (or two) and Saturday afternoon college football.
I remember reading her book. She was the other swordfish boat captain in "A Perfect Storm".
Ummmm.. Loster roll!!!
Drooling on keyboard!!
Lobster is over-rated ...
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