THE AMERICAN LOBSTER. 31 



in the food was noticed during the winter and spring mouths, and there was little 

 evidence that the appetites of these animals sensibly abated during the cold weather, 

 yd it is probable that food is less abundant and less necessary in winter. (See pp. 

 24, note 1, and 25.) 



That lobsters catch lish alive there is no doubt, but lew have ever seen this feat 

 performed. Fish which inhabit the bottom, like the flounder, would naturally fall an 

 easy prey to their powerful claws. They are said to catch the sculpin, and I have 

 known a lobster which was con lined in an aquarium at the United States Fish Com- 

 mission station in the summer to seize and devour the sea-robin (Prionotvs evolans). 



The common blue crab [Gallinectes hast&tus) is said to capture fish, and fishermen 

 report having taken haddock on trawls with the heads almost nipped off, as if cut by 

 the claws of the lobster. 



The smaller of the large claws is essentially a pair of toothed nippers, the hard 

 tips of which are incurved so as to enable the auimal to secure and hold every 

 object which it can fairly seize. This is sometimes called the " fish claw " or the u quick 

 claw" by fishermen in Maine, while the heavy crushing-claw is called the "club claw," 

 and according to Travis (191) it was known in England in the last century as the 

 "knobbed" or "numb claw." 



While lobsters are great scavengers, it is probable that they always prefer fresh 

 food to stale. Some fishermen maintain that there is no better bait than fresh herring. 1 

 Fresh codfish heads, flatfish, sculpins, sea robins, menhaden, and haddock are also 

 used, as well as salted fish. The flesh of the shark is occasionally utilized by the Gay 

 Head fishermen on account of its firmness and lasting qualities. 



In the lobster pound at Southport, Maine, the lobsters are fed chiefly upon herring 

 and sculpin. The fish are scattered around the shore and over the pond. They stop 

 feeding them after the 1st of December, and the fall stock is taken out for the winter 

 market in January, February, and March. 



In the large lobster pound at the Vinal Haven Islands 1 have seen the muddy 

 bottom scored in all directions — the work of lobsters in their search for clams. One 

 is there reminded of a pasture in which the soil has been rooted up by pigs. As a fish- 

 erman remarked, if you put lobsters in a- pound and do not feed them, they will soon 

 turn over the bottom as effectively as it could be done with a plow. Some of the holes 

 which the lobsters had made in digging clams were 2 feet in diameter and 6 inches 

 or more in depth. Here they had dug up the eelgrass, or loosened it so that it had 

 floated to the surface, and cartloads of it had been cast ashore. We have already 

 seen that lobsters sometimes eat parts of this plant, 2 but they had plainly rooted it up 

 in this case with another object in view. The broken and often comminuted shells 

 of the long-necked clam (Mya arenaria) could be seen strewn everywhere about their 

 excavations. 



The lobster probably attacks such large and powerful mollusks as the conchs, 

 which live upon hard bottom, in deep water, and devours their soft parts. Anillustra- 



'I am told by Mr. M. B. Spinney, of Cliffstone, Maine, that many years ago, when lobsters were 

 very abundant, hi' and bis father used "wash bait" in taking them. Fish, such as the mackerel, were 

 minced up and put overboard. Then, as lobsters came flocking from all directions about the boar, 

 they would gaff them. 



-The grass- wrack, or eelgrass (Zostera marina), belonging to the pond- weed family (Naiadacece), is. 

 with one or two exceptions, the only flowering plant found growing submerged in salt water on the 

 New England coast. 



