'I wouldn't call it glamorous work, but it is strangely satisfying,’ confesses zoologist Chris Weston, as he picks up a giant pipette — adapted from a modified turkey baster — and leans over a bubbling glass tank. Inside, hundreds of tiny, translucent specks are drifting around in the water. At first glance, they look like plankton, roughly the size of fennel seeds; but, on closer inspection, I realise each one is actually a tiny lobster, complete with claws, legs and miniature twitching tail.

‘These are our Stage Fours,’ Chris points out, before sucking one up into his over-sized pipette and decanting it from the tank into a celled release tray. ‘They’re about three to four weeks old by now, which is when they start to look like lobsters. Unfortunately, this is also when they tend to eat

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