A chemosynthetic clam living in sea grass. Researchers are not sure how lobsters dig them up. Credit Nicholas Higgs

Thanks to the Science section of the New York Times for this article, The Freaky Food Chain Behind Your Lobster Dinner, by Steph Yin:

If you’ve ever ordered a lobster tail from Red Lobster, there’s a good chance some of your meal can be traced back to swamp gas.

Let me explain.

Red Lobster is a major purchaser of Caribbean spiny lobster, a species that lives in coral reefs in the western Atlantic Ocean. In the 1980s, lobster fishers started constructing artificial reefs in sea grass beds throughout the Caribbean to attract these lobsters. Continue reading →