Caribbean Marine Parks should offer Lionfish Licenses

[cdebbie]

Hello,
I am new to Scuba Board but I think I have a good idea to share here. I just returned from 2 weeks on Roatan, Bay Islands, Honduras. There are tons of Lionfish there! I have been going there for 8 years now with my last trip before this one being a year and a half ago. I noticed a marked decline in fish life, particularly juveniles, with the corals looking very healthy. Roatan has a Marine Park as does a lot of the Caribbean, that maintains moorings and regulates fishing and more. Marine Parks are alway needing money for their good work. While chatting at dinner one night a discussion began about Lionfish and what could be done about them. Marine Park Rangers kill as many as they can but they are overwhelmed by Lionfish numbers. It was suggested that Roatan Marine Park and others throughout the Caribbean should offer a Hunter Safety course and when you pass, you could then purchase a "Lionfish license" for $10 or $20 per week. Until native fish figure out they can eat Lionfish, maybe humans could even the odds for a while. What do you think?

 

[cdebbie]

Really? No one want to weigh in on this?

 

[Coralcop]

it's been discussed in the cozumel forum for some time.

 

[Wookie]

Spearing lion fish will have no effect on the population of lion fish. What you are suggesting will put spears in the hands of tourist divers who will then spear anything that swims as well as the reef, the coral, each other, etc., basically anything but a lion fish. Anything that spawns 50,000 eggs a month won't have it's population affected by a few spearo's. If you really want to see a bunch of lion fish, drop down to about 250 feet (with proper gas and training, of course ). The population of big healthy lion fish there will make you gag.

I think arming tourists is a spectacularly bad idea.

 

[Fishspearit]

Spearing lion fish will have no effect on the population of lion fish.

Fortunately, I think most people know better than that. By your own argument, if a female can lay 50,000 eggs in a month wouldn't spearing that one lionfish remove 600,000 eggs a year? Seems that might have an effect on the population.

No one is trying to eliminate them completely, just keep the population in check.

 

[Wookie]

Fortunately, I think most people know better than that. By your own argument, if a female can lay 50,000 eggs in a month wouldn't spearing that one lionfish remove 600,000 eggs a year? Seems that might have an effect on the population.

No one is trying to eliminate them completely, just keep the population in check.

Read some of the data from the folks who actually study lion fish. Spearing and other methods of lion fish removal have no effect on the overall population of lion fish. Most people may "know better" but they are wrong. Spearing lion fish is fun, it's a feel good measure, it is a pastime while diving, but it doesn't matter one whit to the population of lion fish. Don't get me wrong, I have one of the few permits to spear lion fish in the FKNMS SPA's, as well as one of the only permits to remove them in the ecological reserves. I spear every one I see.

As I said earlier. For every one you kill in the top 130 feet, there are hundreds more deep. Spearing lion fish may remove them from a dive site, but they will repopulate the dive site within days, sometimes hours as they move up from the deep.

 

[Fishspearit]

Read some of the data from the folks who actually study lion fish..... Don't get me wrong, I have one of the few permits to spear lion fish in the FKNMS SPA's, as well as one of the only permits to remove them in the ecological reserves. I spear every one I see.

And your one vote doesn't make a difference in an election?

I have read a lot of the data. Why do you think they gave you those permits to spear in the reserves? Just so that you could have fun? I'm guessing that some marine biologists had a say in whether or not a permit to spear lionfish was given to you. Do you see the irony?

If the majority of 'folks who actually study lionfish' felt that hunting them was useless, why are the fisheries management of countries like the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Bonaire, Cozumel, etc. trying to encourage responsible people to spear them? Surely they've consulted 'people who study lionfish'.

The risk of abuse from allowing people to spear just lionfish in a reserve is obvious, yet they still allow you to do it. But you think the people who manage the reserves and issue permits to people like you don't know what they're doing?

Yes, there are more lionfish deep than there are shallow, thanks to divers eliminating them in the shallows. That's the way we want it because the native juveniles live in the shallows where divers roam. Keeping the lionfish population in control in the shallows will help sustain our native fish stock.

 

[redacted]

And your one vote doesn't make a difference in an election?

I have read a lot of the data. Why do you think they gave you those permits to spear in the reserves? Just so that you could have fun? I'm guessing that some marine biologists had a say in whether or not a permit to spear lionfish was given to you. Do you see the irony?

If the majority of 'folks who actually study lionfish' felt that hunting them was useless, why are the fisheries management of countries like the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Bonaire, Cozumel, etc. trying to encourage responsible people to spear them? Surely they've consulted 'people who study lionfish'.

The risk of abuse from allowing people to spear just lionfish in a reserve is obvious, yet they still allow you to do it. But you think the people who manage the reserves and issue permits to people like you don't know what they're doing?

Yes, there are more lionfish deep than there are shallow, thanks to divers eliminating them in the shallows. That's the way we want it because the native juveniles live in the shallows where divers roam. Keeping the lionfish population in control in the shallows will help sustain our native fish stock.

Because neither marine park officials nor politicians, and especially those who are both, want to look like they are doing nothing. Permitting the hunting gives the illusion of doing something. And, in local areas, I'm sure it is effective in reducing populations if there is any value in that such as less accidental encounters/injuries or just the aesthetics.

 

[Fishspearit]

Permitting the hunting gives the illusion of doing something.

What I find so interesting about you guys arguing that we can't affect the lionfish population is that it's a fallacy usually supported by the pro-hunting side. It's the height of man's arrogance to think that our hunting can't possibly affect a species population. We've proven over and over and over that when we set our sites on a species we have a huge effect on their population.

"look out over that plain, buffalo as far as you can see, man can't possibly affect their numbers."

Hundreds of years ago when the fish were so thick on the Grand Banks you could almost walk across them, fishermen probably thought the same thing, me filling my boat with cod won't have any effect at all on the population. We hunted the wild turkey nearly to extinction. I could go on and on with examples of how man has nearly hunted animals to extinction while thinking he would have no effect. Most hunters know this, it's why we respect the game laws that are established.

The argument used to create the marine preserves is that man's spearing and fishing are having too much effect, and now to keep us from hunting lionfish you say that we have no effect?

 

[Wookie]

I fished the Grand Banks, as well as Jeffries and Georges as a younger man. Yes, we wiped out the swords as well as the cod. I really can't remember anyone using a spear as a method of take, but I'm sure your memory and experience is better than mine. I seem to remember gill nets, long lines, and rock hopper trawls, but I'm sure your Grand Banks spearing charter had a profound effect on the swords taken there. and, yes I believe hat unrestricted spearing on isolated reefs like Flower Gardens would wipe the snapper/grouper out in short order. The difference is that lion fish have infested the entire Caribbean, Including Florida Keys, as well as the places where no one goes, like Quito Sueno bank, Riley's Hump, the reef both sides of the Marquesas, northern Cuba, and Cay Sal. If those areas have little to no diver pressure most of the year they will act as nurseries. Remember, this whole infestation started with an estimated 4 fish. That's why they are now genetically identical. The only way to wipe them (IMHO) is with a virus, or make them a commercial species. I think that's why resource managers are encouraging us to shoot them so we develop a taste for them. I'm told that Key West eateries pay $20 a lb from the lobsterman that by catch them in their traps, and they are worth 10 pesos/lb in Cozumel. Make them commercially viable and the population will crash.