Caribbean Spiny Lobster (Panulirus argus)

• Population levels for spiny lobster are unknown, but overfishing is not occurring in the Southeastern United States.
• The spiny lobster fishery in the federal waters of the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico is jointly managed by the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Councils. The Caribbean Fishery Management Council manages the spiny lobster fishery in the EEZ and territorial seas of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
• Spiny lobster is low in saturated fat and is a very good source of protein and selenium. For more information, see Nutrition Facts. (USDA)
• The majority of the U.S. landings of spiny lobster comes from Florida.

Sustainability Status

Biomass: Unavailable
Overfishing: No (Gulf of Mexico, S. Atlantic); Unknown (Caribbean)
Overfished: Unknown
Fishing and habitat: Spiny lobsters are commercially harvested either by diving or using wooden, plastic, or metal traps, while recreational anglers harvest spiny lobsters primarily by diving. Commercial traps are weighted with cement and include a self-deteriorating escape panel that degrades over time. Fishermen commonly string traps along a trap line, with each end of the trap line marked with a buoy. Traps can potentially damage bottom habitat if they are deployed and retrieved from coral reefs or live hardbottom. Seagrasses can also be damaged by placement and retrieval of traps.
Bycatch: Bycatch in the spiny lobster fishery is relatively low. Various reef fishes and ornamental fishes may be incidentally caught in traps. Undersized lobsters are also used by fisheries to attract legal-sized lobsters, resulting in some mortality. Degradable panels are required to prevent ghost fishing if a trap is lost or abandoned. Threatened or endangered species may occasionally become entangled in trap lines.
Aquaculture: Spiny lobsters are difficult to culture because of their long larval life stage, which lasts 6 to 7 months. An open-ocean aquaculture operation in the Caribbean has successfully collected lobsters settling on submerged sea cages. A small number of these lobsters were used in a grow-out study. The study demonstrated that grow-out of lobsters was technically feasible.

Science and Management

The spiny lobster fishery in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico is jointly managed by the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Councils through the Fishery Management Plan for Spiny Lobster in the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic. The commercial fishery for spiny lobster (and to a large extent, the recreational fishery) occurs off South Florida and primarily in the Florida Keys. In order to streamline a management process that involves both state and federal jurisdictions, the FMP basically extended the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's rules regulating the state fishery to the EEZ throughout the range of the fishery, from North Carolina to Texas. The FMP has been amended seven times since its implementation in 1982. Current regulations in the spiny lobster fishery in Florida include a commercial trap reduction program, a closed season, a special recreational 2-day season before the commercial season, recreational trip limits, a minimum carapace length, gear prohibitions, and prohibition on the possession of egg-bearing lobsters. In federal waters off the Carolinas and Georgia, harvesting is allowed year-round but harvest for all fishermen is limited to 2 lobsters per person per day, and no egg-bearing females may be harvested.

The Caribbean Fishery Management Council manages the spiny lobster fishery in the EEZ and territorial seas of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands through the FMP for the Spiny Lobster Fishery of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The FMP was implemented in 1985 to control the harvest level of spiny lobster to stop overfishing, ensure economic stability, improve data and understanding of the resource through biological and socioeconomic research, and reduce gear losses, destruction of habitat, death, and injuries to unharvested immature and adult lobsters. Management measures include a size limit of 3.5 inches or greater, gear restrictions, and the prohibition of retaining egg-bearing female lobsters aboard a vessel (they may be kept in pots or traps until the eggs are shed).

Life History and Habitat

Life history, including information on the habitat, growth, feeding, and reproduction of a species, is important because it affects how a fishery is managed.

• Geographic range: The Caribbean spiny lobster occurs throughout the Caribbean Sea, along the shelf waters of the southeastern United States north to North Carolina, in Bermuda, and south to Brazil and the Gulf of Mexico.
• Habitat: Caribbean spiny lobsters are found from just below the water surface to depths of 1,650 feet. Larvae float in the water column. Post-larvae swim to nearshore environments and settle in dense vegetation, especially among macroalgae. They metamorphose into "algal-stage" juveniles and live within the vegetation until they are about 0.6 to 0.8 inches. They then emerge and take up refuge in crevice shelters provided by large sponges, octocorals (soft corals), and solution holes until they are about 1.4 inches. At about 2 to 3.15 inches, lobsters begin to move from the inshore nursery habitat to coral reefs and other offshore habitats.
• Life span: Maximum age is not well-known. Spiny lobster may live 15 years or more.
• Food: Little is known about the feeding habits of larval stages, but observations suggest they feed on soft-bodied plankton (tiny floating plants and animals). All bottom-dwelling stages of Caribbean spiny lobster feed on mollusks, especially gastropods (snails and slugs) and crustaceans, but will also consume a wide variety of invertebrates.
• Growth rate: Lobsters grow by molting - they vacate their old shells while simultaneously absorbing water, which expands their body size. Molting occurs about 25 times in the first 5 to 7 years of life. Following this cycle, the lobster will weigh approximately 1 pound and reach minimum legal size. A lobster at minimum legal size may then only molt once per year and increase about 15% in length and 40% in weight.
• Maximum size: Spiny lobster can grow to be 3 feet or more in overall body length.
• Reaches reproductive maturity: In the southeastern U.S., females mature at about 2.75 to 3 inches carapace length. In the U.S. Caribbean, females are mature by 3.6 inches carapace length.
• Reproduction: Females have from 500,000 to 1.7 million eggs per spawning. The male deposits sperm packets on the underside of the female. She scratches them to release sperm as the eggs are extruded. The fertilized eggs are attached beneath her tail, at which time the female is referred to as "berried." Eggs hatch in about 4 weeks.
• Spawning season: April through September in the southeastern U.S. and throughout the year in the U.S. Caribbean
• Spawning grounds: In the Florida Keys on offshore reefs
• Migrations: Adults move along shore and offshore seasonally. Caribbean spiny lobsters migrate in single-file lines to deeper water in order to evade the stresses of the cold and turbid waters.
• Predators: Spiny lobster larvae are eaten by fish. Predators of juvenile and adult spiny lobsters include a variety of fish and invertebrates, such as groupers, snappers, sharks, skates, turtles, and octopus.
• Commercial or recreational interest: Both
• Distinguishing characteristics: The spiny lobster has a pair of horns above the eyes, which the American lobster lacks.

Role in the Ecosystem

Caribbean spiny lobster are bottom-dwelling carnivores, preying on snails, crabs, and clams. They are nocturnal, inhabiting coral reefs, burrows and dens during the day, and foraging for food at night. They are preyed upon by many higher-trophic level predators, such as moray eels, nurse sharks, and groupers.

Additional Information

Market name: Spiny Lobster
Vernacular names: Crawfish, Rock Lobster, Bug, Florida Lobster
Several other species are also marketed as Spiny Lobster.

Biomass

Biomass refers to the amount of spiny lobster in the ocean. Scientists cannot collect and weigh every single spiny lobster to determine biomass, so they use models to estimate it instead. These biomass estimates can help determine if a stock is being fished too heavily or if it may be able to tolerate more fishing pressure. Managers can then make appropriate changes in the regulations of the fishery.

The amount of reproductively mature spiny lobster, known as spawning biomass, in Florida has increased over time, especially from 2002-2005. Current status and biological reference points could not be determined for the spiny lobster stock in the Caribbean due to large uncertainties in the most recent assessment. Spiny lobster in the U.S. Caribbean are considered "unknown" with respect to both overfishing and overfished status. In the Southeastern United States, the overfished status of spiny lobster is unknown, but spiny lobster are not undergoing overfishing.

Landings

Landings refer to the amount of catch that is brought to land. In the southeastern United States, annual commercial landings have varied around an average of 2,500 metric tons (5.5 million pounds) since 1969, a few years after the minimum size limit was reduced to 3 inches.

In general, since the 1990s the spiny lobster fishery in the U.S. Caribbean has shown signs of overfishing, and landings, catch rates, and relative abundance have declined significantly since the beginning of the fishery. However, the standardization of available data and better collection of data in the future should allow for a more accurate determination of the status of the fishery. Increased enforcement and possible improvement of the current spiny lobster FMP in the Caribbean should lead to a healthier, more profitable fishery.

Note: Only domestic commercial landings are shown in the graph.

Biomass and Landings

Are landings and biomass related? Landings are dependent on biomass, management measures in the fishery, and fishing effort.

Data sources:
Landings from NMFS Annual Commercial Landings Statistics using "LOBSTER, CARIBBEAN SPINY" as Species and "ALL STATES" as State, Stock Assessment Report of SEDAR 8 - Caribbean Spiny Lobster (2005), and SEDAR 8 Stock Assessment Report - Southeastern United States Spiny Lobster (2005)

Important Dates

South Atlantic and Gulf
1982 – FMP for Spiny Lobster in the Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic is implemented, with a minimum size limit, gear limitations, possession limits, and seasonal restrictions
1987 – Amendment 1 requires commercial permits, limits possession of undersized lobsters, modifies recreational possession and season regulation, modifies closed season regulations, requires immediate release of egg-bearing lobsters, modifies the size limit, requires a permit to separate the tail at sea, and prohibits possession or stripping of egg-bearing slipper lobsters
1992 – Regulatory Amendment 1 establishes a trap certification program for the EEZ off Florida; reduces the number of undersize lobster that can be held aboard a vessel, specifies allowable gear for Florida EEZ, limits fishermen diving at night to the recreational bag limit, requires divers to measure lobster while in the water, and specifies uniform trap and buoy numbers
1994 – Amendment 4 allows the harvest of 2 lobsters per person per day for all fishermen year round, but only north of the Florida/Georgia border
1996 – Amendment 6 addresses bycatch management measures
2002 – Amendment 7 creates two no-use marine reserves, Tortugas South and Tortugas North

Caribbean
1985 – The Caribbean Fishery Management Council's FMP for the Spiny Lobster in the U.S. Caribbean is implemented
1990 – Amendment 1 adds a scientifically measurable definition of overfishing and an action plan to arrest overfishing, should it occur

Notes and Links

General Information:
NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center Fish FAQs

Fishery Management:
Fishery Management Plan for Spiny Lobster in the Gulf of Mexico and the South Atlantic

History of the FMP for Spiny Lobster in the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico

Summary of Regulations for Spiny Lobster in the South Atlantic

Stock Assessments:
SEDAR 8 Stock Assessment Report - Southeastern United States Spiny Lobster (2005)

Stock Assessment Report of SEDAR 8 - Caribbean Spiny Lobster (2005)

Stock Assessment of Spiny Lobster in the U.S. Caribbean (1990)