They support a major fishery in south Florida waters, especially in the Keys. Adult spiny lobsters are gregarious, favoring rocky outcrops, sponges and patch reefs where they hide in the daytime and emerge to hunt for food at night. Juvenile lobsters settle in nearshore shallow waters, hiding in seaweeds. As they mature, they move out to seaward reefs. Phyllosomes drift in ocean currents for up to nine months and pass through 11 stages of development before changing into a transparent, swimming, lobster-like form called a puerulus.
Transparency helps protect phyllosomes and the puerulus from predators.
During the three to four week interval of the puerulus stage, the animal does not feed. The puerulus swims directionally until it reaches suitable nearshore habitat where it settles to the bottom, molts and continues its development as a juvenile spiny lobster. Juvenile pigmentation serves to camouflage small lobsters in the algae where they live. The body form resembles that of adults. Juveniles live on the sea floor among rocks, algae and seagrass beds in shallow waters.