Meet the Scientists: Using Diving and Cameras to Understand Lobster Populations Throughout the Gulf of Maine

The Gulf of Maine has historically been characterized as a low-diversity, high-abundance ecosystem. Fishing pressures and climate change have contributed towards the removal of large finfish species and allowed an expansion of the American lobster (Homarus americanus) population, likely reshaping their behavior and ecology. Some of our ongoing work over the last two years has used baited camera platforms in tandem with dive surveys to investigate lobster density in nearshore habitats to understand whether intraspecific competition impacts lobster nutritional condition.

In hundreds of hours of video from eight sites ranging from Rhode Island to Midcoast Maine, most of the mobile benthic organisms we have seen are lobsters, clearly demonstrating their dominance in the region. Lobster abundance and sizes have varied widely between sites. Contrary to our expectations, we have found no apparent correlation between lobster abundance and nutritional condition. Intriguingly, apparently similar sites within 3 km of each other could have markedly different lobster size structures, suggesting that lobster behavior and habitat selection may influence survey results on local scales. We are continuing to work to understand how competition and resource availability may impact lobster populations in a changing environment.