170 BULI/ETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 



Even when every edible part of this animal was saved, which is seldom or never done, 

 the total waste was found to be 45 per cent, and the cost of all edible parts 45 cents per 

 pound. At the present retail prices of from 30 to 35 cents per pound, these estimates 

 would have to be considerably increased. 



GEOGRAPHICAL RANGE OF THE AMERICAN LOBSTER. 



The American lobster (Homarus americanus) is found only on t he eas tern coa s t of 

 North America . Its geographical range covers about twenty degrees ot north latitude, 

 from the thirty-fifth to the fifty-second parallel, and embraces a strip of the North 

 Atlantic Ocean 1,300 miles long and 30 to 50 miles wide, and according to one estimate 

 7,000 miles in length when measured along the curves of the shore. Its vertj caL distri- 

 bution varies from i to over 100 fathoms. The most northern point at which its capture 

 has been recorded is Henley Harbor, Labrador {209) ; the most southern point, the coast 

 of North CaroUna.'' Since the fishery was begun on the southern New England coast 

 and was gradually extended northward, it is not surprising to find the lobster at the 

 present time not only more abundant but attaining the greatest average size in the north- 

 erly parts of its range — in eastern Maine and the Maritime Provinces. It should be 

 noted, however, that three of the largest lobsters captured in recent years are from New 

 Jersey. (See fig. i and table i, p. 195.) 



HISTORY AND IMPORTANCE OF THE LOBSTER FISHERIES IN BRIEF. 



According to Dr. Richard Rathbun {227), who was the first to give us a history of 

 the American lobster fisheries, this fishery as a separate industry began toward the close 

 of the eighteenth or the beginning of the nineteenth century, and was first developed 

 on the coast of Massachusetts and in the region of Cape Cod and Boston, some fishing 

 being "done as early as 18 10 among the Elizabeth Islands a;nd on the coast of Connect- 

 icut." "Strangely enough, this industry was not extended to the coast of Maine, 

 where it subsequently attained its greatest proportions, until about 1840." 



The early white men learned many lessons in fishing from the Indians, and those 

 living upon the coast in the course of time began to supply settlers more remote, until 

 the Cape Cod region, having become famous, attracted fishermen with their smacks from 

 Connecticut and from other states, and furnished most of the lobsters consumed both 

 in Boston and New York for fifty years, or until the middle of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury. In 181 2, as Dr. Rathbun remarks, the citizens of Provincetown, realizing the 

 danger of exhausting their fishing grounds, succeeded in having a protective law enacted 

 through the state legislature, apparently the first but not the last of its kind, for legal 

 restrictions, including this statute, have been in force ever since. But this measure 

 was designed to protect the fishermen rather than the lobster, for it was merely declared 



a So far as known, the lobster has been taken but four times on the North Carolina coast during the pastforty years, namely; 

 One lobster in 1870 at Beaufort; one dredged by the Albatross in 1884 off Cape Hatteras in 30 fathoms; one said to have measured 

 18 inches, caught in a gill net at Nags Head in 1903 and exhibited for some time as a curiosity at Elizabeth,Virginia; and another, 

 as noted by J. N. Cobb, was caught by a fisherman at Oregon Inlet, presumably not far from the latter date. For the last two 

 notices I am indebted to Dr. H. M. Smith of the U. S. Bureau of Fisheries. 



