Secrets Haunt the Lobsters' Sea

by Charlene D'Avanzo

  “Let’s go through this again.”

  I shifted on the bouncy gunwale and pushed the mask up off my face.

  “We usually monitor juvenile lobsters in real shallow water.” She said. “But with the Gulf of Maine warming, they may be settling in water that’s deeper and colder than where I’ve been looking for them. Not good if you’re trying to predict how many lobsters will be out there for lobstermen to catch in the future. So like I said, this is a scouting trip for a possible new sampling station. We’ll start at roughly seventy-five feet, and move closer to shore and shallower water. Thirty feet is what I’m most interested in, but I figured you’d like to see the deeper habitats.”

  On the way over to the dive site, a protected area well away from boat traffic, Laurie had warned me that the most of the dive wouldn’t be too exciting. I didn’t care. Being underwater—the hidden domain of the biology I studied—was always a treat, no matter what I saw. Starting the dive in stunning deep-water kelp beds, habitat for organisms I didn’t often see in their home territory, would add to the adventure. I very much appreciated the thought.

  Regulator in hand, she said, “That’s it. Any questions?”

  “Houston, I am good to go.”

  “Great. I’ll start down the anchor line. The visibility is probably poor. Keep me within view at all times, and I’ll do the same with you.” Then, with one practiced move, she leaned back and disappeared over the side.

  Still balanced on the gunwale, I settled the mask over my eyes, saw squat, yanked the thing off, and delivered a mouthful of spit onto the faceplate. A quick rub cleared the condensation. Mask properly in place, I popped the regulator into my mouth, looked skyward, fell back into the water, and rolled upright underwater.

  The first moments of a dive are always magical for me. In an instant, ambient everyday sounds I’d barely noticed—waves sloshing against the hull, drone of distant boat motors, harsh laugh of gulls overhead—were gone in an instant. I’d entered the dense, utterly foreign world of watery creatures that extract oxygen from seawater through specialized organs like gills. It’s a domain instantly deadly to terrestrial air breathers who disobeyed the rules or pushed them beyond the limit.

  Fatality rates for divers matched motor vehicle deaths. Nearly ninety percent of dead divers broke a cardinal rule and went down alone.

  As Laurie predicted, abundant floating microscopic plankton, derived from the Greek word for “wanderer,” reduced visibility considerably. Still, I could easily see her holding onto the bowline ten feet below. I glided down and hovered next to her.

  She made a circle with her thumb and forefinger and extended the other digits up—the divers’ way of asking, “Are you okay?”

  I repeated the gesture. “I’m okay.”

  Next she made a fist with one hand and extended her thumb downward. “I’m going down.”

  I nodded and repeated the okay maneuver.

  Holding onto the line, hand over hand I slowly descended. When the weight of the water above pushed uncomfortably on my eardrums, I had to stop and clear my ears—create pressure inside my ear canal to match the outside water pressure. The tricky procedure required me to pinch my nose and gently blow air into my Eustachian tubes. The welcome “pop” told me I’d succeeded.

  Laurie, who descended more quickly, hovered above the bottom until I reached her. She signaled again with the okay maneuver, and I returned the gesture. Laurie pointed in the direction I knew was shoreward. Side by side, we leisurely glided toward a kelp bed where golden-brown seaweeds, about ten feet long and a foot in diameter, streamed sideways with the current.

  The seaweed, what scientists call algae, had scientific names that rolled off a marine biologist’s tongue: Alaria esculenta and Saccharina latissima. As the name “saccharina” implies, animals from sea urchins to humans eat that particularly sweet alga. Thankfully, some of Maine’s maritime farmers now grow sugar kelp, which takes pressure off nature’s kelp communities.

  A cluster of Maine kelp is called a bed, although forest would better portray the scene we floated above. But to creatures from the air world, this was a bizarre forest indeed. Swaying idly this way and that as they surrendered to the current’s will, amber seaweed “trees” were bathed in otherworldly green light. And like birds zipping through dense trees, clusters of tiny fish flashed silver as they wove in unison between swinging kelp blades. I dove down to the bottom and traversed the forest’s edge to explore how the kelp stayed put. Like a tangle of tree roots in appearance, each kelp blade has what’s called a holdfast. I tried to poke a finger into the structure, but its grip on the rocky bottom was so fierce I failed. Not surprising since this anchor, which doesn’t carry water or nutrients up the blade, has to withstand swirling currents that would toss my body about like a rag doll.

  I was happy to see a scattering of green sea urchins, a little larger than golf balls, clinging to the kelp blades. Kelp is a preferred food for these herbivores, and large masses of them can decimate a bed with their sharp pointy teeth. Usually their numbers are kept in check by predators including lobsters, crabs, and several fish species. That changed in the late nineteen-eighties when Maine humans—in search of the urchin’s orange-yellow reproductive tissue called “uni”—became their top predator. As a result, urchin numbers plummeted.

  Urchin roe is a delicacy in Japan and elsewhere and a good urchin diver could make $5000 and more a week, depending on the season. Total landings in the state reached $40 million in 1992. Unfortunately, the boom quickly went bust as the unregulated industry decimated the urchins. We humans never seem to learn.

  I was tempted to glide through the forest and investigate dozens of animal species it sheltered from current and predators—wonders like purple sponges, sea slugs, wave whelks, sea squirts, blood stars, and scallops. But I didn’t. My last dive in British Columbia’s magnificent kelp forests had nearly ended in catastrophe when a sudden current hurled me into a tangle of kelp. Wrapped like a mummy, I managed to slice through the binds with my dive knife and the encouragement of a sympathetic seal. The experience was not something I wanted to repeat.

  Beyond the kelp bed where Laurie waited, there was still plenty to see. Below and on the water, the Gulf of Maine is astoundingly diverse. The most recent marine census yielded a whopping three thousand species including over six hundred kinds of fish, a hundred eighty birds, thirty mammals, and over seven hundred different types of algae. The numbers surprised scientists because people have fished, crisscrossed, and thrived on the productive waters that stretch from Cape Cod to Nova Scotia for hundreds of years. It was humbling to recognize how little biologists knew about this historic body of water literally in their back yard.

  Clearly eager to examine the gravelly shallows ahead, Laurie flicked her fins and glided on before I reached her. I matched her speed and tried to register each new creature below. A flower-like pink anemone waved its frilly tentacles, trying to entangle and stun prey foolish enough to come within reach. Words from Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea popped into my mind—that the ocean is a “curious anomaly…where the animal kingdom blossoms, and the vegetable does not!”

  Beyond the anemone and humped over a clam, a starfish wiggled hundreds of little tube feet and pulled apart its prey. A sea urchin grazed algae from a rock face, leaving a barren swath in its wake. What looked like a codfish darted away and scared the crap out of me.

  The good-sized lobster was too alluring to pass by. I caught up with Laurie and with hand signals managed to covey my desire to stay put and lobster-watch. She nodded, pointed to her destination, and showed me all five fingers. The shallows she wanted to see were within view, and she only needed five minutes to check them out. Good. I could keep an eye on her and enjoy the lobster at the same time.

  Twitching its antennae as I approached, the good-sized crustacean backed into its hidey-hole between two rocks. Unlike a human shackled with scuba gear, the lobster is beautifully adapted to its environment.
Its two long antennae act as sentinels for vibration, and sensory hairs covering its ten legs can “taste” the waters for chemical clues. Having no need for heavy weight belts, lobsters are neutrally buoyant and can tiptoe along the bottom on their walking legs.

  Dead and red, a lobster draped across a dinner plate looks nothing like the live animal a foot from my dive mask. For one thing, live lobsters are neither red nor all the same color. A varying mix of brown, dark blue, and green, lobsters can be as distinctive as human blonds, redheads, and brunettes.

  They’re also amazingly agile. Tiptoeing like a graceful ballerina one moment, the animal could blast itself across the bottom with a flip of its tail. As lobstermen with missing digits can testify, a lobster is an aggressive bugger that can get you with a swift, fierce snap of its pincer. Even wearing dive gloves, I wouldn’t reach out to touch a live lobster. Extend a stick, and the animal will grab it and simply not let go.

  Put all that together and you’ve got an animal that everyone loves to eat but hardly anyone truly loves. Unlike pandas and eagles, lobsters are not the least bit cuddly, majestic, or noble. Thankfully, the success of the lobstermen’s conservation measures such as size limits mean the animals aren’t likely to be threatened by extinction anytime soon.

  On the way back to the boat, a foot-long fish that looked very much like a cod glided beneath us on the bottom. Given the cod’s endangered status, I was surprised to see one so close to shore. When we reached the inflatable, I broke through the surface, let the regulator fall out of my mouth, and pushed the mask up off my face. Laurie clung to the boat’s bow line.

  “Wow, Laurie. The dive was terrific. That wasn’t a codfish, was it?”

  “Tomcod. The darn thing swam right in front of me earlier, but I was too busy checking out the bottom to pay attention to much else.”

  “Does that area seem like good juvenile lobster habitat?” I asked.

  “It did look promising, but I won’t know until they settle.”

  On the way out of town, we stopped at a house owned by Laurie’s “friends of a friend.” Nobody was around, but Laurie said they wouldn’t mind if we used the hose to rinse seawater off the gear and ourselves. Much as I love the ocean, salt-encrusted skin is something I never got used to, so I was grateful.

  Since Laurie was a walking lobster library, I quizzed her about the Homarus americana’s future in the Gulf of Maine.

  “I’m pretty careful about making predictions,” she explained. “You know how lobstermen complain that scientists’ dire warnings don’t materialize. We’re in a boom now many researchers didn’t expect. Events like that keep me humble.”

  “I’m not a lobsterman,” I said. “So give me your guarded opinion.”

  “Well, like I said earlier, I’m pretty worried about the mismatch between our low counts of juveniles and what lobstermen are getting in their traps. We don’t know what it means, and that’s pretty unsettling.”

  “Here’s something else I’m been wondering about,” I said. “If you were a lobsterman who understood that the Gulf of Maine is warming, where would you plan to set your strings in the coming years?”

  “That’s exactly the question Calvin Ives has been asking me,” she said.

  “Huh. Interesting.”

  “Actually, ask is putting it mildly. It’s like the man’s obsessed with the issue.”

  “He’s a smart guy, and folks on Macomek look to him for leadership. I guess he understands that warming will be a big deal for lobsters sometime.”

  “I guess. He’s coming into Spruce Harbor for the meeting this afternoon.”

  “Anyone else from the island?”

  “You mentioned you talked to Malicite Dupris when you were out there. He’ll be there.” She downshifted as we approached a hill on the outskirts of Spruce Harbor. “Hey, we’re meeting at six at the Lee Side for beers and burgers. Why don’t you stop by?”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I might just do that. In any case, I’ll see you at the meeting in a couple of hours.”

  15

  The poster titled “Impacts of Climate Change on Maine Lobstering” directed me to MOI’s smaller auditorium. I pulled open one of the double doors and walked into an uncommon scene. In front of the row of seats, small groups of sunburned lobstermen gestured wildly at significantly paler scientists who interrupted them. Seated attendees flipped through handouts or turned to others who’d just settled in next to them. On the small stage, MOI’s Director Frederick Dixon called out without success for people to sit down and be quiet. Someone walked across the stage and handed him a microphone.

  Dixon’s authoritative voice filled the room. “Please, everyone be seated so we can begin this important meeting. We have a very full schedule.”

  The hubbub died down as people who were standing found seats.

  Dixon introduced himself and thanked everyone for coming. “As you all know, this is an unusual event. MOI has long encouraged exchange between our scientists and Maine’s fishing industry, but this is the first time we have devoted a meeting solely to lobstering. You will hear from scientists who study lobsters as well as from working lobstermen. As the meeting’s title signifies, the focus is on the future of Maine’s lobster industry in the context of climate change. Now I will hand things over to Gordy Maloy, President of the Maine Lobster Alliance.”

  Gordy walked toward Dixon. The two shook hand and traded places. Except for one time at a wedding, I’d never seen Gordy looking quite so put together. In place of his usual fringed canvas shorts, boots, and white socks he wore a clean pair of jeans and a tan chamois shirt tucked in.

  Gordy pulled down the brim of baseball cap with one hand and held up the microphone with the other. “You hear me okay without this thing?”

  Several guys called out that they could. Gordy walked to one the side of the podium. “That’s bettah. Guys in this room lef’ their strings early today so they could come ta this meetin’. That’s a big deal. They’re doin’ it partly so scientists remembah that they’re out on the watah every day. No machine or water test matches that kind of learning. On the othah hand, we know the Gulf o’ Maine is changin’ fast, even though sometimes we don’t want ta admit it.” Laughter rippled across the audience. “We don’t know how fast or what’s gonna change, so we need ta keep up with what scientists find out. Our livelihood, kids, communities—all of it—depends on one thing.” He gestured toward the audience. “I know folks in this room. They had dads, granddads, even great-granddads who caught bugs for a living. It’s our life.”

  I’d never heard Gordy speak so powerfully about impacts of warming on Maine’s lobster communities. Given the hush in the room, his message had hit home.

  Laurie Culligan took Gordy’s place and reviewed the schedule of speakers and coffee breaks. It was an ambitious agenda that included a dinner break at the Lee Side followed by an evening session. I wasn’t sure how that would go after Lee Side beers, but the lobstermen couldn’t take off more time. I scanned the schedule, noted when Laurie was speaking, and slipped out.

  At the break, I left my office to take advantage of the free coffee. Cup in hand, I waited for Gordy to finish a conversation and tapped him on the shoulder. “Cousin, that was a terrific introduction to the meeting.”

  Gordy glanced to the side and, for the first time in my memory, the man blushed.

  “Um, thanks.”

  “So how many Macomek lobstermen are here? It’s a long trip for them.”

  “Malicite, Calvin, an’ a couple other guys you didn’t meet. Hope they don’t make any trouble.”

  “Trouble?”

  “They’ve been loud an’ clear ’bout climate change. Money grab for scientists an’ all that.”

  “Not too long ago, you said the same thing.”

  He shrugged. “Mos’ly I was givin’ you a hard time. I know the Gulf ’o Maine is getting’ hottah. What’s causin’ it, that’s anothah thing. Big question is how it changes lobsterin’.”

  This was
significant progress. “Wow, Gordy. I’m impressed. Do you know how many other lobstermen are coming around?”

  He glanced at the big clock on the wall. “Laurie’s speakin’ after Barbara Poole talks about some kinda fishermen survey.”

  “I want to hear both of them, but who’s Barbara Poole?”

  “A lobsterman from Stonington.”

  Smiling at the irony of female and male bathrooms when women were called “lobstermen,” I visited the women’s facility, then slipped through the auditorium door and took a seat in the back.

  Brown ponytail bobbing against her navy T-shirt, lobsterman Barbara Poole strode across the stage as if it were just her usual walk down the pier to her boat. Her lumberjack physique revealed that the woman hauled hundreds of fifty-odd-pound traps each working day. From the smiles and enthusiastic applause, it was obvious that her fellow fishermen liked and respected lobsterman Poole.

  Smiling, Barbara acknowledged the response with a little wave. “Thanks everyone. It’s great to see so many of us heah. The American Fisheries Center did a real interestin’ survey an’ asked if I’d present it in this meetin’.”

  Barbara went on to explain bullet points projected behind her. I learned that the American Fisheries Center had polled a thousand ground-fishing and lobstering permit holders. Since there were so many, they had to take a sample for some specific questions.

  She faced the screen and directed a laser pointer on one of the bullets. “As you can see, about two-thirds checked the politically conservative box.” She turned back toward the audience. “What we’d expect, right? But look at the next thing.” She paused for effect, turned, and pointed at the next bullet. “Even though they’re mostly conservative in their politics, four times as many fishermen said climate change is happening compared to those who said it’s not.”