Padstow is still a working port and one of the catches there is Lobster.  Like many marine species, fishermen have seen Lobster sizes and catch sizes decrease over the years.  This decrease in catch is seen across the UK.

Working together with local fishermen to stop this decline is the National Lobster Hatchery along Station Road in Padstow which opened in 2000.

The Hatchery is a charity and charges a reasonable fee for entry (£7 for a family of 4) to it's visitor centre.  Inside there is something for all the family.  There are several tanks of adult lobsters and crabs, including a huge 50 year old lobster, landed near Padstow. 

There' splenty of information too with details on a lobsters diet side-by-side with several recepies on how to cook them!  Rounding the corner you get to see the lobsters at all their stages of hatching from, what looks like, muddy water, lavae stage right through to what looks like a tiny lobster - at whcih stage they have to be seperated or they would canibalise each other!

So how does the hatchery work? If a local lobster fisherman catches a ‘pregnant’ lobster – that is one loaded with eggs, then the fisherman brings the lobster to the centre where it is placed in special tanks, until they release the larvae.  Once the lobster has released the hatchlings, she is returned to the fisherman – so the fisherman hasn’t lost out at all.  The hatchlings are collected and fed until they reach a size where they have a 40% chance of surviving in the wild to an edible size - compare that with 1% in the wild. 

This idea ticks all the right boxes for us, and I think a visit to The National Lobster Hatchery will make you feel better with yourself next time you are in a sea food restaurant - and there are plenty of those in Padstow.