American lobster
Amazing fact
The American lobster eats its shed shell to replace calcium and help harden its new shell.
NOAA Fisheries
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An illustration based on the real animal.
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The American lobster eats its shed shell to replace calcium and help harden its new shell.
THE REAL WORLD
The real American lobster
- Scientific name
- Homarus americanus
- Japanese name
- アメリカンロブスター
- Group
- Ocean animals
- Class
- Malacostraca
- Order
- Decapoda
- Family
- Nephropidae
- Genus
- Homarus
It lives along the Atlantic coast of North America, from Newfoundland to North Carolina.
Its left and right claws usually differ: the bigger claw has thick teeth for crushing things, and the smaller claw has sharp teeth for cutting.
By day it hides among rocks to avoid enemies, and at night it roams the sea floor in search of food.
How the American lobster lives
As it grows, it sheds its hard outer shell and forms a new one. Mating usually takes place after the female sheds her shell. The female carries her eggs on the underside of her tail. Egg-carrying females move inshore to hatch their eggs in late spring or early summer.
NOAA FisheriesBasic data
- Size
- up to 1.1 mUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Weight
- up to 20 kgUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Active
- At night (nocturnal)University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Diet
- Clams, crabs, snails, small fish, algae and eelgrassUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Range
- The Atlantic coast of North America, from Newfoundland to North Carolina鳥羽水族館
Where the American lobster has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- アメリカンロブスター
- 简体中文
- 美洲螯龙虾
- 繁體中文
- 美洲螯龍蝦
- 한국어
- 미국바닷가재
- Español
- Bogavante americano
- Français
- Homard américain
- Deutsch
- Amerikanischer Hummer
- Italiano
- Astice americano
- हिन्दी
- अमेरिकी झींगा मछली
- العربية
- كركند أمريكي
- Bahasa Indonesia
- Lobster amerika
- Tiếng Việt
- Tôm hùm Mỹ
- Русский
- Американский омар
- বাংলা
- আমেরিকান গলদা চিংড়ি
- اردو
- امریکی لابسٹر
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 鳥羽水族館 — アメリカンロブスターChecked: 2026-11-04
- University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web — Homarus americanusChecked: 2026-11-04
- NOAA Fisheries — American LobsterChecked: 2026-11-06
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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