Does anyone know if the local fishermen build shelters for lobsters(casitas) down there? They are typically made from cinder blocks and pieces of tin roof, but they also sometimes use old car hoods or anything else that will last a while in the water.
They are illegal in Florida because they create piles of "junk" in the water and they think that it makes it too easy to over-harvest the lobsters, but it is legal in the Bahamas and some other places.
I think the shelters have a net benefit since it reduces the incentive to fish on the coral reefs and that providing shelter also protects the lobsters from natural predators. However, there should be some common sense used in what materials the shelters are made from. They are used extensively in Cuba, where they are like small concrete garages and the fishermen use large government boats to collect the lobsters.
Basically, you put some cinderblocks in an area where there are lobsters, put a sheet of roofing on top, then use more cinderblocks to weigh the thing down. Some guy in Florida was recently busted with over 6000 lobster tails in his freezer that he had gotten from the casitas he had placed. He was sentenced to a year in jail and his lobsters were sold at auction.
If you just put a cinderblock in the water, you can sometimes find those big crabs inside one of the holes.
They are illegal in Florida because they create piles of "junk" in the water and they think that it makes it too easy to over-harvest the lobsters, but it is legal in the Bahamas and some other places.
I think the shelters have a net benefit since it reduces the incentive to fish on the coral reefs and that providing shelter also protects the lobsters from natural predators. However, there should be some common sense used in what materials the shelters are made from. They are used extensively in Cuba, where they are like small concrete garages and the fishermen use large government boats to collect the lobsters.
Basically, you put some cinderblocks in an area where there are lobsters, put a sheet of roofing on top, then use more cinderblocks to weigh the thing down. Some guy in Florida was recently busted with over 6000 lobster tails in his freezer that he had gotten from the casitas he had placed. He was sentenced to a year in jail and his lobsters were sold at auction.
If you just put a cinderblock in the water, you can sometimes find those big crabs inside one of the holes.
