Find glossary definitions, fishery rule explainers, stock-assessment concepts, and long-form reporting without digging through agency PDFs manually.
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The clawed lobster species Homarus americanus, found from Labrador to Cape Hatteras and managed across seven U.S. lobster conservation areas.
The standard lobster measurement taken from the rear of the eye socket to the back edge of the body shell.
The process by which a lobster sheds its hard outer shell, absorbs water, and hardens a new, larger shell.
The point in the lobster life cycle when postlarvae leave the water column and establish themselves on the seafloor.
A female lobster carrying eggs beneath her tail, where the egg mass looks like dark berries.
A V-shaped mark cut into a female lobster’s tail flipper to identify her as a protected breeder that must be released.
The smallest carapace length a lobster must reach before it can be legally retained in the fishery.
A numbered conservation and management zone used to apply lobster rules, effort controls, and whale-protection measures.
A disease in which shell-associated bacteria degrade the lobster’s exoskeleton, creating lesions that can reduce marketability and survival.
Lost or abandoned fishing gear that continues to trap or entangle marine life after it is no longer actively fished.
Injury or death caused when North Atlantic right whales become wrapped in fishing rope, especially vertical lines from fixed gear.
A major scientific review that updates the models, indicators, and reference points used to judge lobster stock condition and fishing pressure.
Fishing systems that keep rope off the surface until retrieval, reducing the vertical lines that can entangle right whales.
A monitoring program that uses traps without escape vents to estimate the abundance of small, sublegal lobsters before they enter the fishery.
The unusually rapid increase in Gulf of Maine sea-surface temperature relative to the global ocean average.
As the Gulf of Maine warms at three times the global ocean average, American lobster populations are undergoing dramatic geographic shifts. GMRI's 2024 data shows the region recorded its 12th-warmest year, with scientists now predicting populations will decline to early 2000s levels within 30 years. Here is what the science says.
American lobster conservation faces a pivotal moment: the 2026 ASMFC Benchmark Stock Assessment found the Gulf of Maine/Georges Bank stock has declined 34% since 2018 and overfishing is technically occurring, while southern New England populations remain at record lows. Here is what the science says about the challenges ahead and the conservation strategies that are working.
Abandoned, lost, and discarded fishing gear—ghost gear—kills an estimated 12,500 to 33,000 lobsters per year in Cape Cod Bay alone, and costs the US lobster industry roughly $250 million annually. Here's what the science says and what's being done about it.
Epizootic Shell Disease (ESD) has contributed to a 92% collapse in southern New England lobster landings since 1997. Driven by warming water temperatures and a bacterial consortium led by Aquimarina homaria, the disease erodes the chitin shell and compromises reproduction. Here is what the science says about its causes, impacts, and the path forward.
Lobsters are far more than a valuable fishery — they are keystone predators that shape kelp forests, control sea urchin populations, and drive nutrient cycling across benthic ecosystems. A 2024 meta-analysis in Proceedings of the Royal Society B found kelp forests support 2.4 tonnes of fisheries biomass per hectare annually, and lobster predation is a key mechanism preventing the collapse of these forests into barren urchin wastelands.