Title: How large can lobsters grow? Big! But no one knows how big. - CSMonitor.com
Headings: How large can lobsters grow? Big! But no one knows how big.
How large can lobsters grow? Big! But no one knows how big.
Lobsters can grow to be four feet long, 40 pounds, and maybe 100 years old – maybe even more.
June 16, 2011

Content: Most lobsters in supermarkets and restaurants fall in the one- to two-pound range. American law requires fishermen to toss back anything smaller. But lobsters can get bigger – much bigger. In 2006, a diver caught a 12-pound, 20-inch lobster off the coast of San Diego. In 2008, a Canadian crew snagged a 20-pounder. Yet both of those were pipsqueaks compared with the late king of crustaceans. The Guinness World Record went to a 44.3-pound lobster found in 1977 near Nova Scotia. Guinness didn't note its length, but the US Navy once measured a similarly hefty lobster at four feet long. These clawed colossi aren't freaks or flukes, explains Jelle Atema, a professor of biology at Boston University. They're just very old.