Maine lobstermen harvested over 100 million pounds of lobster in 2011 – that’s the biggest haul ever…

An AP article in the NYTimes quoted Patrick Keliher, the Department of Marine Resources commissioner, noting that the preliminary 2011 numbers showed that the lobster population along the state’s jagged coast was healthy.

What’s helping lobsters do so well? Our colleague Chuck Anderson over at Sousa Seafood offered four possible reasons:

MINIMUM SIZES: In 1988, Maine increased the minimum size of lobster to 3 1/4 inches as measured from the back of the eye socket to the start of the tail.  Canada has a slightly smaller minimum size of 3 3/16 inches. NY, NJ, and Connecticut have a slightly larger minimum size of 3 3/8 inches. The larger minimum sizes established in the 1980’s allowed more females to reach sexual maturity before being harvested. This is a huge reason why lobsters are doing so well now.

MAXIMUM SIZE:  In Maine, lobsters over 5 inches are thrown back. Large, older females can produce 50,000 eggs or more, while young reproducing female lobsters may produce 5,000 to 10,000 eggs. Generally, Maine produces lobsters between 1.25lb and 2.5 lbs. The larger lobsters occasionally available on the market are bycatch from fishing trawlers, or from select areas allowed to catch jumbo lobsters in Massachusetts.

FEEDING: One reason for the success of lobsters is because we feed them.  Thousands of lobstermen regularly tend hundred of thousands or millions of lobster traps on a regular basis.  As lobstermen, tend their traps, they remove legal size lobsters, add bait to the trap, and put the trap back on the bottom.  The traps are designed so that small lobsters can get in, eat, and get out or the trap.   Lobsters and a few other small crustaceans enjoy this easing food supply, but large fish can’t get to the bait.

FEWER ENEMIES: One of the most common predators of lobsters are large cod. While cod stocks may be doing well in many areas, the # of large cod is much lower than before modern fishing technology changed the game. Since the 1980’s there are fewer large and whale cod. The % of scrod and markets size cod is greater than 20 years ago. Note: Scrod cod are under 4lbs, market cod are 4-10lbs, large cod are 10-25lb, and whale cod are 25lb and up.

We’ve got live lobsters on hand in a variety of sizes, just give your Santa Monica Seafood Representative a call!