Lobster Fishing

I love lobster. Fortunately while we were in Guanaja, most of our meals were fresh caught seafood. Lobster is a major fishery in Honduras. There are a couple of ways to catch lobster.

One is by trap boat. These boats stay out to sea for 8 to 9 months at a time setting and pulling lobster traps like those seen below.
Working on a trap boat is hard, lonely work. However, consider the other way.

The boats with lots of little dorys on top are commercial lobster dive boats. These boats and their crew of lobster divers and tenders work on average 15 day shifts. The divers dive for 14 of the 15 days, 6 to 8 hours a day, catching lobster by hand! They have no gauges (depth or pressure) and no training. The job pays well but takes a horrible toll. As they say "there are no old lobster divers". Many of the young ones are crippled from the bends (excessive, potentially fatal, buildup of nitrogen in the body) . Our divemaster and boat driver were both ex lobster divers. Neither one liked to talk about it. The boat driver Tony would only tell us that he quit after he was attacked by a shark while spearfishing on his day off, trying to catch fish for his family. The scars on his body told the rest of the story.
Below are a couple of links that describe the plight of Honduran and Nicaraguan lobster divers. You will never look at those lobster tails quite the same way.

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/segments/working/lobsterdiving.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/10/1001_021001_lobsterdivers.html

Guanaja, Bay Islands, Honduras, Feb/March 2009