Besides the normal colored lobsters, there are also rare blue, yellow, red, and white ones. Except for the white ones, they all turn red when cooked. Lobsters grow by molting. They molt, or shed their shells, about 25 times in the first 5 years of life. No one has yet found a way to determine the exact age of a lobster because it sheds its shell so often.

Lobsters "smell" their food by using four small antennae on the front of their heads and tiny sensing hairs that cover their bodies.

The teeth of a lobster are in its stomach. The stomach is located a very short distance from the mouth, and the food is actually chewed in the stomach between three grinding surfaces that look like molar teeth, called the "gastric mill".

Lobster blood is usually a gray or slightly blue color, but it can sometimes be orange, green, or light pink. 

A lobster egg is the size of the head of a pin. A 1-pound female lobster usually has between 8,000 to 12,000 eggs, which are attached to the underside of her tail. She carries the eggs for about a year until they are released as larvae. Only about 1/10 of one percent of those eggs will live past 6 weeks.

It takes 4 to 7 years for a lobster to grow to legal size.

The largest lobster in captivity is at the Maine State Aquarium in Boothbay Harbor. The huge live lobster weighs over 24 pounds and is estimated to be almost 100 years old. The aquarium is also home to a blue lobster, which are quite rare, approximately 1 in 1 million.

DID YOU KNOW ...

• As a lobster grows, it sheds its shell, increasing in weight by 25% each time, and a lobster will shed its shell 24 times the first year.
• A lobster that has lost a claw in a fight is called a "cull".
• A lobster is approximately 7 years old before it is legal to harvest, and it will weigh about 1 pound.
• A lobster takes 18 to 24 months to develop from time of impregnation to the hatching of the egg.
• An older lobster only molts every four or five years.
• A lobster is the size of a mosquito when it leaves the female's body.
• A lobster will catch fish, other crustaceans, and mollusks for their food.
• A lobster will commonly store food by burying it on the bottom of the ocean and defending the area much like a dog.
• A lobster's age is approximately his weight multiplied by 4, plus 3 years.

The Maine aristocrats turned up their noses at lobster -- They made their servants eat it.

Today, seafood lovers can't wait to get their hands on these tasty crustaceans.  

INSTRUCTIONS

If you really want to enjoy every mouth-watering morsel, follow these simple instructions. 

1) A fresh Maine lobster ready to eat. 

2. Make sure you are wearing appropriate clothes (i.e. skip the fancy outfits) or don a bib. Twist off the eight small legs. Suck out the meat and juices. Crunching down on the legs helps.  

3. Twist off the claws. 

4. Crack the claws then take out the meat. Don't miss the slivers of meat in the claw's "thumbs."  

5. Tear and twist off the tail from the body. Break off the flippers and treat them in the same manner as the small legs. Now you can get the tail meat out. Place your thumb on the back of the tail where the flippers were and push hard. The tail meat will shoot out the front.