Sustainable Lobsters
As a sponsor of the National Lobster Hatchery, we donate 50p for every lobster bought at Wing’s online fish shop (theCornishFishmonger.co.uk), helping them to conserve and grow the lobster population and preserve our coastal marine bio-diversity within Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.
Local fishermen and shellfish wholesalers donate egg-carrying female lobsters to the hatchery. After the eggs hatch, the lobster larvae are reared under artificial conditions until they metamorphose to juvenile lobsters, at which point they are further grown until they are released into suitable habitats with the assistance of local fishermen and divers .
In the wild, around one in ten thousand lobster larvae are likely to survive to become juvenile lobsters. Under hatchery conditions these survival rates are dramatically improved, enabling young lobsters to be given a head-start with protection from predators and starvation.
Thanks to sensible fishing practices and the good work of the National Lobster Hatchery, lobsters are on the increase here in Cornwall. They live very comfortably in rocks off both the south and north coast of Cornwall and being very lazy creatures they don’t tend to migrate much – which is why the stock enhancement programme run by the hatchery works so well.
The National Lobster Hatchery can be found on the docks of the picturesque Cornish fishing village of Padstow. Their aim is to help maintain a healthy lobster population in Cornwall through conservation, education and research.
www.nationallobsterhatchery.co.uk