For the September 8th Atlantic Aquasport shore dive we ended up at Fort Stark in New Castle, New Hampshire.
We saw several American Lobster during the dive. One of them even tried to grab my camera with its claw.
We swam east into the Piscataqua River to get a little distance from the shore and depth and then turned south. The bottom was thick with hooked week, sea lettuce and green hair weed, giving the Lobsters lots of places to hide.
Towards the end of the dive I came upon an interesting scene. A Lobster was doing something with a crab or crab shell (I did not see any claws so it could have been just a shell) that was tucked up under a clump of seaweed.
The University of Maine Website tells us, “Lobsters like to eat crabs, clams, mussels, starfish, smaller fish, and sometimes even other lobsters.” So the the crab could have been killed by the lobster. If so, that must have been quite a battle. Perhaps the lobster had eaten some of the crab and was hiding the rest for a later meal.
Resources
- University of Maine: Lobsters
- Maine Lobster Now: Maine Lobster Facts
- Climate & Lobsters | NOAA Climate.gov
- Oceana: American Lobster
The Digital Gallery Blog 