Rare orange lobster spared by Colorado Red Lobster employees

An extremely rare orange lobster was spared by employees of a Pueblo, Colorado, Red Lobster restaurant last week because its coloration reminded them of the NFL’s orange and blue Denver Broncos.

That lobster, now named “Crush” after the football team’s 1976-1986 “Orange Crush” defense, has since found a new home at the Downtown Aquarium in Denver, aquarium officials announced Friday in a Facebook post. A dishwasher and biscuit-maker at the Pueblo Red Lobster found Crush on July 12. 

“Myself and many of my team are born and raised Denver Broncos fans, so as soon as we saw that orange color, we knew that Crush would be an excellent representation,” Kendra Kastendieck, the general manager, told the Associated Press, adding that “we all want our defensive line to be that good again.”

Some diners at the chain restaurant located were confused by Crush’s coloration.

“We actually had several guests see him in the tank in our lobby and asked why do we have a cooked lobster in our lobster tank,” Ms. Kastendieck told KDVR-TV.

Ms. Kastendieck first shopped the lobster to the local Pueblo Zoo, but when they said they could not take Crush, she instead approached the Denver Aquarium.

Alternately-colored lobsters are a statistical anomaly, with the odds of an orange lobster being born roughly one in 30 million, the aquarium said. Crush is only the second orange lobster the aquarium has had in its 25-year history, officials said.

Crush, who was caught off of the coast of Canada, will be quarantined for 30 days before being put in an exhibit at the aquarium shared by other species from the cold waters of the North Atlantic Ocean. 

“We’re hoping he’s on exhibit in time for the regular season and that he brings [the Broncos] good luck this season,” Downtown Aquarium General Curator Ryan Herman told the Denver Post.

Crush is not the only orange lobster to escape the business end of a boiling pot in recent years. In 2022, two lobsters named “Biscuit” and “Cheddar” were found at Red Lobster locations in Meridian, Mississippi, and Hollywood, Florida, respectively.