Spiny lobster

Photo: terence zahner · CC BY-NC

Caribbean spiny lobsters are nocturnal foragers that shelter communally in reef crevices by day in groups called apartments. They lack claws but defend themselves with sharp rostral horns and rough antennae they rasp noisily against attackers. One of the Caribbean's most commercially important species, they undertake seasonal mass migrations in single-file queues across the seafloor — a behavior rarely witnessed but documented at several eastern Caribbean sites. Their abundance at Aquarium is a direct result of reserve protection.