The American lobster is found upon the Atlantic coast from New Jersey to Labrador, and yet almost nothing has been published in regard to its traits and local distribution. It lives upon rocky, gravelly, and sandy bottom, from low water down to twenty or thirty fathoms and perhaps deeper, but not probably at great depths. It feeds upon any kind of animal matter either fresh or decaying, which it can discover.

In Long Island Sound the lobster fishing begins late in March or early in April, and continues till late in the fall, although the greater part are taken in May and June. On the coast of northern Massachusetts and Maine, whence the winter supply comes, they may be taken nearly all the year round. The time at which the females carry eggs varies very much on different parts of the coast, being later and later as we go farther north; south of Cape Cod, in Long Island and Vineyard Sounds, they are found carrying eggs from the first of April till late in June. At Portland, Maine, they were carrying eggs till the middle of August, while in the Bay of Fundy they are found with eggs from mid-summer till September.

Soon after the hatching, the young leave their parent and live for a considerable period a very different life from the adult. At first they are not more than a third of an inch long, and have scarcely any resemblance to a lobster. They are furnished with long swimming branches to the legs and swim about freely in the water, living most of the time near the surface, like many kinds of free swimming shrimps. With each change of the skin they become more and more lobster like, until when a little more than half an inch long they appear like veritable little lobsters, but still have the free swimming habits of the earlier stages. During this period, which must be several weeks, they are constantly exposed to the attacks of fishes and all sorts of marine animals, while they themselves pursue and feed upon still smaller fry. Any attempt to rear great numbers through these stages in confined areas would probably prove unsuccessful, as the young at this time require a great amount of pure sea water and peculiar food, found only where minute, free-swimming animals congregate.

Alter they become a few inches long, the growth of lobsters is slow. They increase in size only at the times of shedding the shell, which probably takes place only once a year for those of ordinary size, and the increase at each of these changes is moderate, as may be seen by comparing the size of the cast shell with the lobster a few days after leaving it, although the increase of weight is considerable. In lobsters of very large size the shell is not always changed, even as often as once a year.

How early they begin to breed is somewhat uncertain. Females not more than half a pound in weight are, how ever, found carrying eggs, but in these small females the eggs are comparatively few in number. The average weight of lobsters sold in New York market is about two pounds.

The lobster can be propagated easily, yet there are always more or less difficulties to overcome. One of the principal is to find a place suitable to build a pond, and then to build it so that the young cannot get away. The pond should be built in some place where the salt water sets in from the ocean, and should be screened in such a way that the water can flow in and out with the rise and fall of the tide. It should be fenced on the seaward side, and possibly all around, so as to prevent the lobster from going over the land to the ocean. In June, put in a few thousand lobsters, and we have no doubt there will be a most abundant return. Lobsters carry their spawn under their tails until they hatch, and the young are carried in that way for many days, when they drop off. Thence forward they look out for their own food. A single lobster will hatch as many as 1,000 young. If there are many lobsters in a pond it will be necessary to feed them, but any refuse from a slaughter-house or fish-market will answer for this purpose.