CRUSTACEA 289 



Range. The American lobster ranges along the Atlantic 

 seaboard from Labrador to North Carolina. Possibly no ven- 

 ure in the field of marine aquiculture would prove of greater 

 economic valne than the introduction of this species into the 

 Pacific ; but although egg-bearing lobsters have been shipped 

 across the continent by thousands and in carload lots, up to 

 his time all attempts of the "United States Bureau of Fish- 

 eries to colonize the Pacific have failed. While hiding among 

 he crevices of rocks would seem to suit the habit of the 

 obster best, it apparently thrives as well on sandy and even 

 muddy bottoms, and it ranges from the tide pools to water 

 100 fathoms, or even more, in depth. 1 



Size, growth, and life history. Female lobsters spawn once in two 

 \ r ears; the eggs as laid are cemented to the swimmerets underneath 

 r,he abdomen, and here they are carried during the long incubation 

 period from July or August of one year till May or July of the next. 

 The hatchlings delicate, transparent creatures about one third of an 

 inch in length swim feebly, or rather "tread water," and so tend to rise 

 reward the surface. They feed voraciously upon copepods and diatoms 

 i hat they find floating in the water, and they eat one another whenever 

 they can a vicious habit which is one of the chief difficulties in rear- 

 ing them artificially. They swim thus for two or three weeks, growing 

 and molting three times in the interval, all this time at the mercy of 

 i 1 very tide, wave, and current and of every open mouth they may 

 encounter. This is the critical period in the lobster's life, and probably 

 not one in ten thousand, under natural conditions, survives its accidents 

 and dangers. 



At the third molt .the young assumes adult form, and the tiny lob- 

 sterling tends to seek the bottom and may even begin to burrow for 

 greater protection. It is now a little over half an inch in length, still a 

 helpless morsel for every sharp-eyed minnow. When it is about twenty- 

 five days old, the fourth molt brings the lobsterling to the fifth stage, 



1 Barnes, Methods of Protecting and Propagating the Lobster, E. L. 

 Freeman Co., Providence, Rhode Island, 1911. Refer to this for further data 

 on the habits and natural history of the lobster. Also, if undertaking 

 special work on this problem, write to Experiment Station, Wickford, 

 Rhode Island, for up-to-date information. 



