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Nature & Environment

Very rare blue lobster caught off Maine

By T.K. Randall
August 27, 2014 · Comment icon 8 comments

A blue lobster specimen at an aquarium. Image Credit: CC BY-SA 3.0 Stevenj
Teenager Meghan LaPlante discovered the crustacean while checking lobster traps at the weekend.
The bright blue lobster, which scientists say is a 1 in 2 million specimen, demonstrates a vivid shade of blue due to a genetic defect that leads to the excessive production of a certain protein.

14-year-old Meghan, who helps her parents out during the summer at Miss Meghan's Lobster Catch in Old Orchard Beach, is no stranger to finding unusual catches in her traps but admits that she has never seen anything like this one before.
The blue lobster has since gained the attention of marine experts across the United States and will be donated to the Maine State Aquarium for further study.

Despite its rarity however there have been some even more unusual shades of lobster hauled up from the depths of the ocean over the years. The odds of finding a bright red lobster for instance are 1 in 10 million whereas a yellow one is even rarer at 1 in 30 million.

Rarest of all however is an albino lobster with no coloring at all with odds of 1 in 100 million.

Source: Boston Globe | Comments (8)




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Recent comments on this story
Comment icon #1 Posted by ChrLzs 10 years ago
huh .. little versions of that are quite common here in our freshwater creeks - 'blue yabbies'.. aka .. Cherax Destructor!!! ..but yep, that's a pretty cool find!
Comment icon #2 Posted by maximusnow 10 years ago
A little Garlic and lots of butter .....ummmmmmm!
Comment icon #3 Posted by Sundew 10 years ago
huh .. little versions of that are quite common here in our freshwater creeks - 'blue yabbies'.. aka .. Cherax Destructor!!! ..but yep, that's a pretty cool find! They are quite common in the aquarium trade in the U.S., there is a white form also (not albino).
Comment icon #4 Posted by libstaK 10 years ago
What color are they when they are cooked? Ok that was in bad taste, um, unless of course they taste good - does anybody know if they taste good. *my seafood addiction is showing*
Comment icon #5 Posted by Sundew 10 years ago
What color are they when they are cooked? Ok that was in bad taste, um, unless of course they taste good - does anybody know if they taste good. *my seafood addiction is showing* Actually that is a great question, normal lobsters and some crabs like the blue crab have both blue pigment and red/orange pigment. I suspect the blue lobster simply lacks the orange pigment. We know cooking turns them red/orange, destroying the blue pigment while apparently not destroying the orange pigment. So would a cooked blue lobster, lacking orange pigment be colorless/white or still turn orange from some proce... [More]
Comment icon #6 Posted by Beany 10 years ago
I got side-tracked by the by-the-wind sailors. They're washing up on our beaches here on the Central Coast in California. They're not uncommon, but there's been way more than usual.
Comment icon #7 Posted by bobb73 10 years ago
Awe why he sad?
Comment icon #8 Posted by libstaK 10 years ago
Awe why he sad? Because he knows I want to eat him


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