“Ma, it’s about a fin kick away from the mini season and the regular season in August and I’m a getting’ a hankerin’ for some of them there craw daddies. Get out the nets and sticks, so I can tickle us some supper”.

“Okay  Pa. Every year, I have to listen to your annual lobster story tale (no pun intended). Let’s get it over with, so I can survive another year without your yammerin’”.

“Ma, this stuff is important, so listen up. Lobsters get their name from the rose thorns all over their body they like to stick you with. They use their long antennae to scare off predators, whip the stuffing right out of an eel, don’t ya know. The small antennae are called antennules and they are used to sense movement and “taste“ the water around them. The spiny lobster differs from his northern neightbor, trading in the claws for a pair of sharp horns above his eyes. Lobster blood is colorless, but when exposed to the air turns bluish.

Lobsters are nocturnal…meaning they are busy doing their business while we are sleeping. Now, them bugs start getting frisky around March and they play house until August. The girls take a tidy little packet of good stuff (hey, no blushing here, Ma) and when our girl feels like it, she tears it open and has some fun. One female can carry up to 1.7 million eggs. Unfortunately, our poor girl has to hall all them eggs around for about four weeks. The kids are ready to go when the eggs start to turn brown. Mama lobsters are not very good parents, cause the kids just run wild. Eggs can travel thousands of miles, (they could be immigrants from Cuba or Belize, Mexico even, bi-lingual bugs or even dual citizenship) before they settle in sea grass where they dine on small crabs and snails.

Teenage lobsters form gangs and the adults get disgusted and with them bad boys and head out for the reef. About this time, the adults add clams and sea urchins to their dinner menu.

At about two years old, their carapace reaches about three inches. When they grow, they shed their shells by taking in water to expand their body. A lobster can molt 25 times in the first seven years of life. Once they reach the three inch size (legal size as dictated by regs issued in 1982) they molt about once per year, but at that time they can increase their weight up to 40%. They say a lobster can grow to three feet or more and can live up to 15 or more years.

Lobsters can live several days out of the water if kept cool and moist. Lobsters can live in depths up to 1,650 feet. That walking thing you saw on the TV is done when the water starts to get colder and visibility drops. I ain’t the only bug enemy, Ma. I’ve got to fight off  groupers, nurse sharks, rays, turtles, eels and octopus and it isn’t no picnic. Okay, any questions”?

“Just one more question, Pa. What’s the difference between mini lobsters and regular lobsters?”

For more information on diving with Eco SCUBA to hunt for lobster, click here.