REPORT OF COMMISSIONERS OF INLAND FISHERIES. Ill 



operations extending over exactly ten years, which have resulted in 

 the method of lobster culture presented in this paper. 



CHARACTERS AND HABITS OF LARVAL LOBSTERS. 



It is a necessary preliminary to an intelligible account of the method 

 itself to sketch briefly the habits of larval lobsters and to indicate 

 some of the peculiar difficulties which the method has to overcome. 



Hatching. — The hatching of the ripe eggs of an individual female 

 lobster is a gradual process requiring at least several days and varying 

 with the temperature of the water and perhaps with the lateness of 

 the season. In the latter part of June, when nearly ripe lobsters are 

 brought into the warm water of a shallow estuary, the hatching is 

 accelerated. The fact of the gradual breaking loose of the eggs is 

 undoubtedly of importance in the economy of the lobster under natural 

 conditions, for it prevents the possibility of the swarming of the young 

 fry and the attendant dangers of speedy recognition and capture. 



When the larval lobsters first break out of the egg membrane they 

 are closely coiled in the form of an oval spheroid with the terminal 

 segments of the abdomen bent over the rostrum. In a few moments 

 they straighten out and expand and then immediately take up the 

 pelagic life and instincts which they retain until they reach the so- 

 called "fourth stage," after shedding their skins three times. 



Mode of swimming. — The young lobsters swim by means of vibra- 

 tory movements of their exopodite appendages, which stand out 

 like blades from the thoracic legs, and the swimming is augmented 

 by irregular jerky strokes of the very muscular "tail" or abdomen, 

 which, in all the larval stages, is bent at a considerable angle to the 

 cephalothorax. The swimming must be charactized as slow and 

 weak when we have in mind for comparison that of most young fishes. 

 At any time during the three larval stages the fry can easily be picked 

 out by means of a small scoop, or even with the hand. 



In general, too, the swimming seems to be aimless in direction, so 

 that the fry are easily carried along by the slightest current. This 



