July 29, 2022 — Researchers with the Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR), along with partners from Hood College, the University of New England, and Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, work from June through October each year since 2018 to catch and study the crustaceans in their tiny larval stage to understand how temperature influences where they choose to move and live at the bottom of the ocean.
Within the last two decades, the Gulf of Maine has been warming faster than 99 percent of the rest of the world’s oceans, according to the Gulf of Maine Research Institute. This research could help scientists and fishermen alike understand if climate change pushes lobster populations to cooler waters.