1st Annual Broward County Lionfish Derby RESULTS

[REEF HQ]

Good Morning Florida!

REEF is pleased to announce the results of the 1st Broward County Lionfish Derby which took place on June 30th! With 12 enthusiastic teams 419 Lionfish were caught in a single day! Thank you to all who came out and supported the event and 15th Street Fisheries for being a wonderful host and making some delicious Lionfish Ceviche! Here is a list winners and a link to some photos from the event!

For the Most Lionfish caught 1st place goes to team UMC for their total catch of 227! Spearfishin Critical nabbed 2nd place with 67 lionfish, followed by team Pain Killer with 44. The award for Largest Lionfish went to Spearfishin Critical for their gigantic 411mm (16.18”) catch, followed by Brownies Team with their 405mm (15.94”) lionfish, and Triple Threat came in 3rd with their catch measuring 402mm (15.82”). In our final category, Smallest Lionfish, Team FRAPPER took home first place (80mm/3.15”), followed by team UMC (80mm/3.15”), and Spearfishin Critical at 84mm/3.31”. Click here to see photos!

The next events on our South Florida Derby series will be August 18th in Palm Beach at Sailfish Marina and September 8th in Key Largo at Coconuts. Check out more at our Derby page and we hope to see you all there!

 

[Danielle's_Dives]

yikes! that is a whole lot of lionfish

 

[ft.lauderdale diver]

That's some fantastic results. However it is very strange that Team UMC was able to bring in more than all the other teams combined. I've also heard from multiple people that this team was keeping lionfish in live traps for a few days before the event and simply just loading them in coolers the day of the derby and having the judges count their so called kill of the day. If you look at the board, these jacka$$es weren't able to get the largest and smallest lionfish prizes (thanks team frapper for getting to the dock earlier and claiming first place), thank goodness even using their "unsportsmanlike" practices.

I only hope that the sponsors that are shelling out the prize money can try and ensure that this blatant "cheating" can be curtailed because a few knuckleheads who are scheming to try and capture all the prize money unfairly. Their actions will prevent other teams from competing in the future thus hurting the overall effort of the initiative.