A rare, bright blue lobster caught off the coast of Donkin, N.S. is attracting attention at a lobster pound in nearby Lingan.
“Sylvia” is heading to an aquarium at Toronto’s CN Tower, but she spent the weekend in Cape Breton for Father’s Day.
“Getting a dozen lobsters for Father’s Day and I came in to see the blue lobster too, the famous lobster,” said customer Ronnie White on Sunday.
So, what gives Sylvia her bright blue hue? Experts say it’s a genetic mutation that causes the crustacean to overproduce a certain protein.
Sylvia isn’t the only unusual creature to arrive at the Lingan lobster pound - a few weeks ago, an albino white lobster named Stan came for a visit.
The odds of catching a blue lobster are one in two million, while the chance of finding a white one is one in 100 million.
“It’s our first time seeing a white one and first time seeing a blue one,” says Shirley Rockett, who owns the lobster pound. “They’re very much an attraction, there’s a lot of people just stopping by to see them.”
But the oddly-coloured crustaceans don’t stop there; a fisherman brought in a large lobster with a yellow-green tint on Sunday afternoon.
“First time I’ve ever seen a green one. It’s a rare one, and I’ve been fishing for a few years,” says fisherman Matthew Boutilier.
With lobsters in nearly every colour of the rainbow, the pound has been busy with visitors wanting to see the rare catches.
“By word of mouth, it’s been getting around,” says Rockett. “People are just dropping in and calling me up, asking ‘can we go out and see it now?’ Even after we’re closed, they want to come see it.”
“I hang around some of the fishermen and they’ve never caught one before, so it’s awesome,” says White. “I might never see it again.”
With files from CTV Atlantic's Ryan MacDonald
