Wild Lobsters — with Dan Rodgers, Bottom Line Fisheries

Dan Rodgers has been lobstering out of Corea, Maine since 1988 — a first-generation fisherman who grew up on the water and never left it. In 2017, he opened his boat to visitors, and Catch Your Dinner was born: guests watch as Dan and his daughter bring the traps full of lobster onto the boat, band lobster claws, and learn about the conservation practices lobstermen have used since the beginning — then eat what they caught.

In this episode, Dan walks us through what a day of lobstering off the coast of Maine actually looks like, how a hand-painted sign by the side of the road turned into a full-blown tour business almost overnight, and why the fishery's most important conservation tool — the v-notch — was invented by fishermen, not regulators. It's a story about a hundred-year-old fishery that polices itself, a family business built one word-of-mouth voicemail at a time, and what it means to understand where your food comes from.

In this episode:

• What a typical day of commercial lobstering looks like, from 2:30 a.m. on
• How Catch Your Dinner Tours started with a hand-painted sign and grew from there
• The V-notch, and the billion-notch challenge reshaping lobster conservation statewide
• How invasive green crabs are changing life along the Maine coast
• What Dan hopes every guest understands about where their food comes from

Guest: Captain Dan Rodgers, Commercial Lobsterman & Founder, Catch Your Dinner Tours

• coreacatchyourdinnertour@gmail.com
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• Instagram: @catchyourdinnerlobstertour

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