American Lobster

The American lobster, also known as the clawed lobster, or the true lobster, Homarus americanus is a crustacean, an animal with a hard exoskeleton or shell, jointed appendages and two pairs of antenna. Ranging from Labrador to North Carolina this animal is found eating, breeding and roaming the ocean floor of the northwest Atlantic. Lobsters prefer to make their homes in rocky areas where they can hide in the crevices from predators. Like all arthropods, lobsters must molt, or shed their old shell, in order to grow. After molting the new shell is soft, leaving the lobster vulnerable to predators until the shell hardens.

Lobsters are not fussy eaters. Although they prefer fresh food they will eat basically anything that they can get their claws on, even if it's dead. The main diet of a lobster is crabs, mussels, clams, starfish, sea urchins and various marine worms. Lobsters eat mostly animals, but if these resources are scarce, as they are sometimes in the spring, a lobster might eat plants, or even sponges to survive.

The biggest predator of the American lobster is man! After man, other predators include ground fish such as flounder and cod, eels, crabs, and seals. According to the Guinness World Records, the largest lobster was caught in Nova Scotia, Canada and weighed 44.4 lb! Live lobsters are not red like the cooked ones you've bought at the store or restaurant. The color of a live lobster varies among individual lobsters, but most lobsters are either olive green or greenish brown. Orange, reddish, dark green or black speckles are commonly found adorning a live lobster and a bluish color is often found at the joints of the lobster. Completely blue lobsters have also been found.

The Atlantic lobster is intensely fished all along the northeast Atlantic coast of Canada and the United States as far south as New York, and particularly in Maine. Lobsters are considered a food delicacy around the world. In Japan and much of Europe, they are extremely expensive; in North America, much less so. According to French chefs, the only way to keep the real flavor of a lobster, without getting water inside, is to steam the lobster ten minutes in a basket over boiling water, and serve it cold with mayonnaise!

Photo courtesy of Joe Kunkel.