Over the past year, I have heard some reports of live spiny lobsters in Northern California. Tom Stienstra wrote about some observations from Lake Merritt and along the open coast here:
http://www.sfgate.com/outdoors/article/Unusual-critters-from-far-away-sighted-in-Bay-Area-6662345.php

We just heard from a fisherman that he saw a live lobster in the San Francisco Bay just last week!

If you are out in the bay or along the coast, beachcombing, diving, or exploring in any way, and see a spiny lobster molt or live animal, please take photos and share your find!

Your observations are key to our understanding of the changes in this species' range.

We are only asking for geotagged photos, but just in case you are wondering about the fishing rules for California Spiny Lobsters, here they are:

1. You must have a sport fishing license and a lobster report card.
2. You can only take them by hand or with a hoop net.
3. Use of SCUBA to fish for lobsters, north of Carmel is not allowed.
4. No use of traps.
5. The minimum size limit for California spiny lobster is three and one-fourth inches, measured in a straight line on the midline of the back from the rear edge of the eye socket to the rear edge of the body shell.
6. You can only have seven lobsters in your possession at a time....including in your freezer!
7. The recreational season this year runs Saturday, October 1, 2016 through Wednesday, March 22, 2017

You can find out all you need to know about the fishery here:
https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/Conservation/Marine/Invertebrates/Lobster

Thanks,
Rebecca

Way back in 2011, as part of Coastal Cleanup Day, I did a beach clean up at one of my favorite places in the world, Duxbury Reef, also known as Agate Beach.

Like all things in Bolinas, the beach is equal parts tough to find and magical.

Normally, once down the main path, I head south to the extensive tide pools, but a a beach clean up, is on the beach, not amongst the rocks, and not planned for the lowest tides. In search of trash and something new, I took my bag and headed north instead. My trash haul wasn't impressive. I think I ended up with about a cup full of small plastic and a shotgun shell or two (plastic shot gun shells was down waterways from the delta and are one of the most common types of trash we see on our beaches).

I did find one treasure though, the molt of a California spiny lobster. The furthest north these lobsters are supposed to found is near San Luis Obispo, a good 250 miles to the south!

Sometimes, paying attention along the road less travelled, leads to amazing things.

I couldn't believe it, so I started this project on iNaturalist to encourage and aggregate finds.

Since that day four years ago, I have found molts on Agate Beach every year, had reports from San Francisco and San Mateo counties, and heard many anecdotes detailing places people have seen them alive.
In order to properly document this potential range extension, we need more data and live specimens.

And then this weekend, I read about a live lobster found in Lake Merritt (!) and live lobster begin caught off the coast of San Francisco!

http://www.sfgate.com/outdoors/article/Unusual-critters-from-far-away-sighted-in-Bay-Area-6662345.php

If you are walking on the beach ANYWHERE in California, especially north of San Luis Obispo, keep your eyes peeled for the brick-red 'shells' of these lobsters, snap a photo, and upload it here.

Thanks!

California Spiny Lobsters are a well known and loved species in Southern California and Mexico (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_spiny_lobster). They are fished for both recreationally and commercially. They are the largest native lobster on our coast and can be easily recognized by their orangish-red color, bumpy carapace ('shell') and large, long antennae. They can be anywhere from 2 -20+ inches long from head to tail, although for the fishery they are measured from the rear of the eye socket to the end of the carapace and the minimum size for take is 3.25 inches (http://www.getbentsportfishing.com/forum/showthread.php?t=16363)
Unlike their cousins from Maine, they do not have claws!

These lobsters are found along the California and Mexican coasts among rocks from 0-90m (0ft -over 300ft). Young lobsters can be found in the intertidal among the surf grass. The well-accepted northern range limit of these magnificent animals is south of the Monterey Bay. They are nocturnal hunters and eat sea urchins, worms mussels and clams. They are eaten by cabezon and other fishes, octopuses and sea otters.

The California spiny lobster is found in parts of the Gulf of California, and along the Pacific coast of the length of the Baja California peninsula, extending as far north as San Luis Obispo Bay, California. There are occasional records from Monterey Bay, but the conventional wisdom is that the water there is too cold for the California spiny lobster to breed, and it is thought that any adult found in Central California arrived as a larva during El Niño years.*

After mating and spawning in the summer months, California Spiny Lobsters shed their exoskeleton or carapace (sometimes called, shell) in order to grow larger. Their carapaces, or 'old shells' often wash up on beaches after they molt.

For the last few years, we have recovered spiny lobster molts and heard reports from volunteers about finding carapaces on beaches in San Francisco and Marin counties. Most of these molts have been found during August, September and October.

We are extremely interested in tracking the potential northward range extension in these animals!

We need your help to record any lobster molts you encounter on the beach or live lobsters you see while diving anywhere in California, but especially north of the Monterey Bay.
If you find molts of pieces of molts on the beach, please take photos and upload them to this project.

If you see live lobsters, please check for eggs and take photographs of both the dorsal (top) and ventral (underside) sides of the animal.

Thanks so much!

* From Wikipedia and
Lipke B. Holthuis (1991). "Panulirus interruptus". FAO Species Catalogue, Volume 13. Marine Lobsters of the World. FAO Fisheries Synopsis No. 125. Food and Agriculture Organization. pp. 142–143.
Alice Cascorbi (February 10, 2004). "Seafood Watch Seafood Report. Spiny Lobsters, Vol. II. California Spiny Lobster Panulirus interruptus". Monterey Bay Aquarium. http://www.seafoodwatch.org/cr/cr_seafoodwatch/content/media/mba_seafoodwatch_californiaspinylobsterreport.pdf