Improving marketability through translocation: a lobster case study from southern Australia

Translocation as a method to increase the value of less-marketable, deep-water southern rock lobster Jasus edwardsii was explored. First, variation in the commercially important shell colouration and body shape between deep-and shallow-water Tasmanian populations and among South Australian and Victorian populations was quantified. Deep-water J. edwardsii were pale in colour, with longer walking legs but less meat content than shallow-water, red-coloured J. edwardsii. Traits in body shape were variable among deep-water populations across the three states and between sexes in each population. Deep-water lobsters were then translocated to a shallow-water inshore reef to determine whether the observed variation in traits was plastic and whether translocation could be used to improve the quality of deep-water lobsters. Translocated lobsters were then monitored over a 14-month post-release period, and during this time, they changed from a pale/white colour to the more marketable red colour within a single moult. Plasticity was observed in tail morphology, but not in leg morphology. The translocation experiment was successful in transforming pale/white deep-water lobsters into red lobsters with higher market value in a phenotypic response to habitat manipulation. Translocation appears to have commercial application for exploiting natural plasticity in the market traits of lobsters to increase price.