YORK, Maine — Local lobstermen are saying they’re pleased to see the lobsters here are finally shedding their shells and are getting hungry, filling traps that until now have been pretty light because of colder-than-usual ocean temperatures during June and early July.
York is home not only to numerous local lobstermen but also boasts two global wholesalers in Maine Coast Company and Maine Lobster Outlet. And for those who want lobster on their plate tonight, there are local retail operations like Off the Boat Lobster on the York River.
As July makes its way into August, these stakeholders shared their perspectives to compile a snapshot of the industry — both this summer and over time.
Lobstermen across Maine have experienced a slow start to the season, according to Patrice McCarron, director of the Kennebunk-based Maine Lobstermen’s Association. Lobsters want the water to warm up a bit before they start moving from underneath rocks, shedding their shells and looking for food.
“Down East where the tides are much stronger, the warmer water on the surface mixes with the colder water on the ocean floor,” McCarron said. “Here, there is stratified water, so until you have a good blow, the bottom layer can remain cold. It can just stay stratified. It happens. Lobsters are very temperature sensitive.”
This spring, the warmer surface water did not make it to the ocean floor like it typically does, so lobsters that are usually moving about and filling up traps by July 4 were staying put in larger numbers than usual.
“It’s been a slower start than some people want, but that happens,” York lobsterman Mark Sewall said. “We had a bunch of years where there was good fishing years earlier in July, so we’re a little bit behind average. We’d like to be up to our waists in lobster right now. But we’ll be alright.”
Jeff White, president of the York Lobstermen’s Association, said this season is “more like 20 years ago. You never expected to get anything until the middle of July. Why is it different? I really don’t know. The lobsters know and they’re not telling. Every year is a new surprise. We may catch 50 percent of all the lobsters we catch in a given six weeks. And we expect it to happen next year and it never happens.”
The relative dearth of local lobsters earlier in the season has caused Lindsey Ramsey of Off the Boat Lobster to scramble a bit to serve her clientele. Off the Boat is a lobster shack at Sewall’s Bridge in York, and was started by Ramsey eight years ago. She gets most of her lobsters from her father, lobsterman Jeff Donnell, as well as her brothers and an uncle who also lobstermen.
Ramsey said she sells thousands of pounds of lobster each week from her small business to locals and summer visitors alike.
“I’ve had to expand my contacts a little to get more lobsters,” she said, although she prefers to stay in York as much as possible. “Fourth of July was tough this year. Everyone wants lobster on the Fourth of July. This year, it went into Tuesday. Next year it’s on a Wednesday. I wonder what that’s going to be like!”
Because the lobsters have been scarce, she has had to charge customers more per pound than last year at this time. And she’s also had to work to get lobsters caught farther north.
Finally, just this past week, she said, “things seem to be evening out. The price is finally down. Today, I noticed when they were getting off the boat they were finally smiling. I haven’t seen that up until now.”
Retail customers at Hannaford supermarket in York this week were paying $7.99 per pound for lobster, and the price typically drops more toward late summer.
This year’s slow start was just a seasonal blip in an otherwise healthy fishery, McCarron said. And it was only in the southern part of the Gulf of Maine. Farther north, where Ramsey was having to go to satisfy her market, the season has been strong. And that’s true of the industry as a whole, she said.
“Southern Maine holds it’s own. It’s always been steady and trending in a positive direction,” Ramsey said. “But in midcoast and Down East Maine, since 2010, they’ve seen their landings double and triple.”
In 1995, she said, total Maine catch was 25 million pounds; in 2016, the catch was 130 million.
“The abundance of lobster has gone off the charts,” she said.
Asked why, she said, “if we could answer that question, we’d be gazillionaires right now.”
Maine has strict harvesting rules and a system of distributing lobster licenses that precludes industrial fishing. Also, she said, “the ocean conditions have changed quite a bit, so there’s a downturn in groundfish stock to prey on baby lobsters. The environmental conditions are essentially ideal for lobsters to survive.”