Why Cut Lionfish Fins Off?

Hi:

Reading through threads over time of people using varied devices to nail lionfish, it seems hunter danger is high right after the spearing; either trying to stab it in the head if you want a mercifully hastened kill, or 'pruning' off at least some of the venomous spines, or trying to get it in your bag (I assume) if you're taking them with you.

But a lot of people let native sea life have them. Now, I'm not trying to incite a debate on whether direct wildlife feeding is going to inspire big green morays to accost other others, or a barracuda to 'accidentally' take somebody's hand off. You can get the lionfish off your <insert device - ELF, etc...> & let the body drop.

So I keep wondering why people endanger themselves by pruning off the fins. I assume the rationale is to keep scavengers such as grouper, sharks, barracuda & morays from getting stung, but I haven't noticed any posts so far where someone has seen a predator act stung in response to eating an 'unpruned' lionfish.

If trimming them were extremely safe or stings minor it'd be different, but that's not the case.

So, if divers want to spear lionfish & leave them falling to the bottom thrashing around, without trying to stab them in the head or trim their fins, is that a big deal?

Richard.

P.S.: I know a plea for merciful quick kills may come up, and I respect the rationale. That said, many fish kill each other by swallowing, where presumably suffocating perhaps while being burned by stomach acid is a common means of death for many sea creatures. Life in the sea is often hard.

Think there is only one spine that is actually venomous.. but anyway I think they cut the spines off so they become more dinner-ready

And.. if you can make lion fish a commonly eaten dish it would help create demand for catching them!

You cut them off and put them in soup.

Oh wait... wrong fish. :cool2:

"So I keep wondering why people endanger themselves by pruning off the fins." So they can't swim.

Assuming you've speared it, it's going to dive anyway, and it'll quite swimming then (if not before).

Richard.

sorry guys all the spines along the dorsal are venamous as are the 3 anal fin and both pec fins are too
and the end of the day yes it hurts a great deal even if you get scratched by them!
So if you are allowed to spear them then spear and dump them ASAP!!!
some people were spearing in TCI (not allowed) but we have some very friendly reeffies that VERY quickly learned DIVER+SPEAR= FREE FOOD !!
il go bump him!!! and then it became DIVER+ANYTHING = FOOD it became very iffy!!

Early on we speared them and assumed they died. One floated to the surface and was living. Several recovered from their injuries and got well to feast on the reef. So now we make sure they are thoroughly dead by spearing and then taking the big knife and cutting deep behind the head. Some of those big ones are tough but they've got to go or there will be nothing to look at except lionfish.

Grouper eat them whole....spear it and feed it to a grouper. Unless of course grouper are in season, then shoot the grouper too.

I have speared a number of lionfish that got off the spear and swam away. So I learned to cut the gills or the neck. I got poked while cutting the neck one day, so now I cut the dorsal spines and then cut the neck.

When I was in Cayman Brac the guides went Lionfish hunting on many of the dives. They would spear them, while they were still on the spear they would insert them into a container that had a one way valve. The container was a 2 and 1/2 gallon water jug with the spout cut off. The lid was a plastic disc that was cut from the middle out kind of like a pizza. The fish was pushed thru the middle of the top and then when the spear was pulled out the fish stayed in the jug. Sorry if this description sounds a little confusing. After the dive was over the guides would remove all the spines with a pair of surgical shears. The guides ate a lot of lionfish on a weekly basis. They gave some out to the divers to cook in their condos and even made ceviche for the boat one day. My apologies if this is off the main topic of the thread.