A recent Oregon State University
study shows that controlling the invasive lionfish in the western Atlantic
Ocean is likely to allow for recovery of native fish. The lionfish is estimated
to have wiped out 95% of native fish in some Atlantic locations. This Atlantic
invasion is believed to have begun in the 1980s and now covers an area larger
than the United States.
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With venomous spines and aggressive
behavior, the lionfish has no natural predators in the Atlantic Ocean and will
eat almost anything smaller than they are including fish, shrimp, crabs and octopus.
Lionfish can withstand starvation for protracted periods; many of their prey
species will disappear before they do.
OSU and Simon Fraser University
scientists have shown in both computer models and 18 months of field tests on
reefs that reducing lionfish numbers by specified amounts, between 75-95%, will
allow a rapid recovery of native fish biomass within the treatment area, and may
aid larger ecosystem recovery to some extent as well. The researchers have
learned that the solution will be found in controlling the lionfish either by
creating safe havens for other fish or spearing one lionfish at a time.
“This is excellent news,” said
Stephanie Green, marine ecologist in the College of Science at OSU, and lead
author on the report published in Ecological Applications. “It shows that by
creating safe havens, small pockets of reef where lionfish numbers are kept
low, we can help native species recover.
“And we don’t have to catch every
lionfish to do it.”
Researchers acknowledge that the
rapid spread of lionfish in the Atlantic is virtually impossible especially
considering that they have now found the lionfish thriving in difficult to
access deep water locations.
The latest research used ecological
modeling to determine what percentage of lionfish would have to be removed at a
given location to allow for native fish recovery. At 24 coral reefs near the
Bahamas’ Eleuthera Island, researchers removed the necessary amount of lionfish
to reach their modeled threshold and monitored the ecosystem recovery.
On reefs where lionfish were kept
below threshold densities, native prey fish increased by 50-70%. This study
demonstrates that reduction of an invasive species below an environmentally
damaging threshold versus eradication can have comparable benefits.
Some of the fish that recovered, such
as Nassau grouper and yellowtail snapper, are critically important to local
economies.
Read more at Oregon
State University.
Lionfish
opening wide image via Shutterstock.