The life cycle of the lobster: the eggs

We are talking about the life cycle of the American lobster. On the last post, we discussed mating, but now, what happens after that? Amazingly enough, the female lobster will hold on to that sperm for about a year before she uses it. That summer, she will fertilize her eggs with it, by laying them under her tail. A berried female is one that shows all of her eggs glued under her tail, looking like thousands of little black berries. Inside each egg is an embryo, and during another 12 months or so, that embryo will develop by actually molting several times inside the egg. In the photo below, we can see the black mass of eggs in between the swimmerets under the tail (abdomen).

In the meantime, the female will hold on to those eggs by keeping her tail curled in, and every now and then she will actually open her tail and fan the eggs with seawater. One can speculate that she is caring for her offspring, but nothing is certain. The eggs do stay attached to her during that time, until they are ready to hatch the following summer. So from the time the lobsters mate, to the time the young lobsters hatch, nearly two years have gone by.