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The History Of Lobster
By James Hunt, Tue Jan 10th
Lobster was popular among Native Americans in the past. In yearspassed, lobsters were plentiful and were used by the NativeAmericans to fertilize their fields and they were used as baitfor fishing. In colonial times, was considered to bepoverty food. They were harvested and were fed to children andprisoners. In most cases it was only the very poor people whoate all the time. Not only were children and prisonersforced to live on but also so were servants and slaves.Over time the servants rebelled and in some parts of the UnitedStates they had it put into their contracts that they would notbe forced to eat only lobster. In the early 1800's, people began catching lobster. Gatheringthe by hand along the shoreline did lobstering, as itwas called. Lobstering as a form of trap fishing did not comeinto effect until around 1850. This first occurred in Maine.Maine still plays a major role in the fishery, as it isthe largest producing state in the United States today. Demand For Lobster Over the years the demand for increased so much that1836 a company by the name of Burnham and Morrill began
canninglobster. This company canned the and began sending itout to different parts of the world. In the early years it wasonly sent to areas of the world that were easily accessible byboat. The canning of was not faced with the samehardships and difficulties that were associated with shippinglobster, therefore by the second half of the 19th Century, thevalue of canned surpassed that of live lobster.
Today however, the demand for live
has increased and hassurpassed that of canned lobster. No longer is seen aspoverty food. In fact, it is just the opposite. In most casestoday
it is only the upper class people that can afford to buylive in grocery stores. In order to catch lobsteranywhere in United States
and Canada, you must obtain a licensefrom the Department of Fisheries. In certain
areas there arealso quotas being placed on the fishery. The lobsterfishery has also been turned into a seasonal fishery,
whichmeans that people are only permitted to fish for atcertain times during the year. |
