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Welcome to Brain Stuff, a production of IHeart Radio.

Hey, Brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum here.

Lobsters are odd creatures.

Their appearance has earned them the nickname Cockroaches of the Sea, and yet they're

considered a delicacy by people around North America and Europe, which is where the cold water

lobster genus Homerus resides, which is the one we're talking about today. As we've discussed on

the show before, they haven't always been so prized. Lobsters were so abundant

around New England during the 17 and 1800s that their meat was fed to pigs, and some indentured

servants in Massachusetts were so sick of eating it that they went to court to prevent their bosses

from feeding them lobster more than three times a week, and they won.

But whatever you think of them, lobsters are quite sophisticated critters.

Today, let's talk about how they interact with the watery world around them,

including why they don't age, making them biologically immortal, though not functionally.

But, okay, let's start a little bit more granular.

Lobsters don't see particularly well, but they make up for it in their senses of taste, smell, and touch.

A lobster has four spindly antennae and sensing hairs that allow it to smell amino acids in the water, like those given off by prey.

Lobsters are carnivores that will hunt and eat pretty much anything they can get their

claws on.

They're even known to munch on their vulnerable lobster brethren,

though that's more common in captivity, and is also why captive lobsters will have rubber bands

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