Cozumel and other Caribbean destinations re lionfish

[MMM]

I had an interesting chat on the SI today with a guy on the boat. He has dived in many other Caribbean destinations over the past 15 years or so. His observation is that the fish life has been sadly decimated in many of his favourite destinations due to lionfish rendering them as no longer interesting to dive EXCEPT Cozumel! Here there has been an aggressive attack on lionfish and he noted the VAST difference in the quantity and species of reef fish. His comment was that no other place in the Caribbean can boast this quality and quantity of reef fish.

Now it has been a while since I have dived elsewhere in the Caribbean, after I fell in love with Cozumel. What do the rest of you think? How has Cozumel weathered the lionfish invasion relative to other Caribbean destinations?

 

[Tunaman68]

They were going after them pretty strong in Bonaire as well. I thought the fish life there was outstanding.

 

[CNYMAD]

We felt Little Cayman was controlling the population agressively. Reef and fish live were outstanding.

 

[MMM]

We felt Little Cayman was controlling the population agressively. Reef and fish live were outstanding.

That is interesting. Little Cayman was on his list of places where things have badly deteriorated from 15 years ago.

 

[salth2owannabe]

They were going after them pretty strong in Bonaire as well. I thought the fish life there was outstanding.

I'd agree, and it appeared to be effective. We dove there 2 weeks in January and it was the middle of the first week before I saw a lion fish. There were a few dives I saw multiple lion fish on but those were the exception. We've dove Belize the last few years and the dive masters would shoot some for dinner. It was pretty easy for them to shoot 6-8 on a dive.

 

[hroark2112]

There are spots in Bonaire where you can find them by the hundreds. Just have to know where to find them and bring lots of air to get there.

I wish they would allow more people to kill them. On one dive last trip I could have easily bagged about 75.

 

[kmurray719]

I was in the Turks and Caicos about a month ago, and we saw multiple lionfish on every dive. According to what I was told they are not hunted at all there. There were still tons of other fish around, so it didn't seem that it was affecting the fish populations. Yet.

 

[briankinley2004]

I was on a live aboard doing Roatan/Utila about 3 years ago. We speared dozens if not hundreds of lion fish. I was unimpressed by the reef fish populations and thought the dives were rather boring except for one wreck dive with some large grouper on it. Since this was my first trip there I can't say how it was before lionfish. The dives reminded me of Jamaica diving. Dove Riviera Maya this summer and while it doesn't compare to Cozumel we saw quite a few reef fish and lionfish. Also dove 2 dives in Nassau this past December and was not really impressed with the fish life. Saw several lionfish. Again this was my first time to dive there but snorkeled there about 10 years ago and saw more life than on the dives. The water was fairly cold too and that may have been an issue. We are starting to see a lot of lionfish on the oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. Haven't noticed any deterioration of the fish population but as far as reef fish populations go nothing compares to that of a typical oil rig. They also are different type of habitat than a coral reef so there may not be as many juvenile fish but the lionfish are eating something.

 

[stevep4444]

Lionfish have a negative impact on the reef but I would suspect overfishing,lack of reef protected zones and enforcement of such, and human originated pollution have a bigger impact on reef health and marine life population in most locations.

 

[scrane]

Diving in Roatan in October I saw many large Lionfish and dive masters seemed unconcerned. On Roatan in February I saw no Lionfish but divemasters carried short Hawaiian slings just in case.