Claws for thought: The world leading crustacean conservation charity that is saving our lobsters

'I wouldn't call it glamorous work, but it is strangely satisfying,’ confesses zoologist Chris Weston, as he picks up a giant pipette — adapted from a modified turkey baster — and leans over a bubbling glass tank. Inside, hundreds of tiny, translucent specks are drifting around in the water. At first glance, they look like plankton, roughly the size of fennel seeds; but, on closer inspection, I realise each one is actually a tiny lobster, complete with claws, legs and miniature twitching tail.

‘These are our Stage Fours,’ Chris points out, before sucking one up into his over-sized pipette and decanting it from the tank into a celled release tray. ‘They’re about three to four weeks old by now, which is when they start to look like lobsters. Unfortunately, this is also when they tend to eat each other, so we have to stay on top of things. Otherwise, we’d have an empty tank by the end of the day.’

Founded in 2000 in the north Cornish port of Padstow, surrounded by foodie boutiques, bike-hire businesses and a working boatyard, the National Lobster Hatchery has become a world leader in crustacean conservation over the past 25 years. Since then, it has pioneered scientific research, hosted numerous PhD students, led education programmes and, most importantly, released about 500,000 juvenile lobsters back into the ocean — ultimately helping to ensure the long-term survival of Corn-wall’s population.

‘The UK is the Goldilocks zone for lobsters,’ explains Chris, who joined the Hatchery in 2017 and is now its senior technician and education officer. ‘We’re between the cold waters of Scandinavia and the warmer waters of southern Europe and our coastline is ideal lobster habitat, with lots of rocks and reefs for them to hide in.’

However, by the late 1970s and early 1980s, it was becoming evident that the UK’s lobster populations, echoing those across much of northern Europe, were in a bad way. Pollution, habitat loss and warming water temperatures were all thought to be factors in the decline, but it was obvious what the main culprit was: overfishing.

Although female lobsters, or hens, release thousands of eggs at a time, only about one in every 20,000 survive to adulthood. In addition, as lobsters are slow-growing, only reaching sexual maturity after about seven years, the extraction of large numbers of juvenile and breeding-age lobsters can have a calamitous effect on the overall population. Fears thus began to grow that the UK could be on the brink of a total collapse, akin to the one that devastated Scandinavian lobster fishing in the 1960s and 1970s.

Step forward local legend and lifelong fisherman Eddy Derriman. As Cornwall’s chief fisheries officer, he became a pioneer for change, organising much-needed scientific research and advocating for more sustainable fishing practices. Most importantly, he became the driving force behind the foundation of the National Lobster Hatchery, which opened in October 2000 on the site of a former fish-smoking warehouse on Padstow’s harbour wall. At the time, it was only the second facility of its kind in the UK (the first, the Orkney Lobster Hatchery, opened in 1985).

‘Most years, we release tens of thousands of juveniles,’ Chris continues, plucking an egg-bearing female (or ‘berried hen’) out of the tank to show me the black, caviar-like eggs clustered under its tail. In the best years, yields can be substantially higher: the hatchery’s record was 56,000 in a single year.

The growth process from egg to release-ready juvenile usually takes between six to 10 weeks. Every stage of the life cycle is closely monitored, from the chemical composition, temperature and pH of the water to the nutrients the lobsters are fed.

Releases take place several times a year at sites around the coasts of Cornwall and Devon, with local divers helping to target each one to specific locations to ensure maximum survival. Unfortunately, the fact that lobsters moult their shells several times as they mature makes it practically impossible to track how many ultimately reach adulthood.

However, based on catch data, research studies and anecdotal evidence, it’s become clear that the hatchery has played a crucial role in stabilising Cornwall’s lobster numbers. A close working relationship with lobster fishermen has also been a key part of this success; many skippers now bring berried hens direct to the hatchery for the eggs to be harvested and hatched.

A second hatchery facility is now up and running in Newlyn, based on a modular shipping container design that could easily be replicated elsewhere — but, as always, the challenge is funding. As a registered charity, the hatchery relies on donations, admission fees and research grants for its survival.

To celebrate its 25th birthday, the hatchery is launching a new project this autumn, tentatively titled the Crab Lab and focusing on the European brown crab, which now appears to be suffering the same kind of population decline as the lobster endured more than four decades ago. It would be the first facility of its kind in the UK and, although many of the techniques are likely to be similar, the team believes there will be unexpected challenges. Most pressing of all is finding somewhere to put it. ‘The only space we have left is in our old disabled lavatory, which is about the size of a broom cupboard,’ laments Chris. ‘Hopefully, we’ll scale up as time goes by.’

For now, however, there’s more than enough work to keep the team busy: tanks to clean, pumps to check, water to be changed and, of course, hundreds of baby lobsters to feed. As the first visitors of the day arrive at the hatchery, I bid Chris farewell and step out onto Padstow’s harbour wall, breathing in the briny salt tang of the sea air.

Out in the Camel Estuary, framed against the sands of Daymer Bay, a boat is chugging back into port, its stern piled high with lobster pots. As I head into town in search of a coffee, I can’t help but wonder how many of the crustaceans on board might have begun their lives in one of the hatchery’s bubbling tanks.

This article first appeared in the October 8 issue of Country Life. For more information on how to subscribe, click here