Miniature fitness trackers for lobsters and devices to monitor the quality of their shipping conditions are being prototyped as part of an initiative to reduce stress points and improve survival in the lobster supply chain for the Maine lobster industry.
Miniature fitness trackers for lobsters and devices to monitor the quality of their shipping conditions are being prototyped as part of an initiative to reduce stress points and improve survival in the lobster supply chain for the Maine lobster industry.
The University of Maine Lobster Institute leads the initiative in collaboration with lobster industry partners and scientific collaborators at Saint Joseph’s College and Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve. This effort to improve practices to reduce mortality throughout the lobster supply chain was one of 30 projects nationwide to receive funding earlier this year from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration Saltonstall-Kennedy Program. Of the eight funded projects in the Atlantic region, it is the only one focused on the American lobster.
Lobster“Maine’s lobster industry asked the institute to help quantify and mitigate stress points in the lobster supply chain that reduce survival and profitability,” says Lobster Institute director Rick Wahle, who is based at UMaine’s Darling Marine Center. “The industry calls it ‘shrink’ — the mortality lobsters experience as they change hands from capture to kitchen. It’s been a long-standing, contentious issue that is heating up, both literally and figuratively, in a changing climate and competitive world market.”
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Image via University of Maine.
