Bitten by Parrot Fish

[Capt Dave]

That is strange thing about it. If I had to interpret the behavior, it was defenatly trying to keep us away from the entire reef. The most amazing part to me was that it was going after us at the surface in 45' of water. This is a bottem dweller.
I have had been stalked by barracuda many times, but have learned to ignore them. Now, I don't feel the same.eepwalla

 

[123Scuba.com]

I've hear of a nibbled finger but nothing like this... Glad to hear your daughter is alright. I hope it dosen't discourage her from diving. Perhaps you should teach her to spearfish. Parrotfish are tasty and they started it!

 

[erparamedic]

Glad your daughter is ok!

I'm with all the other posters... strange for a parrot fish to do that! I will think differently about any kind of "stalker fish" now! LOL

 

[Saturation]

Pretty unusual report. I've never heard of such a prolonged attack. Trigger fish are often most aggressive and will follow you relentlessly.

My daughter and I went diving on Saturday on a 45' reef a few miles north of Fort Lauderdale "Hillsboro Domes." Almost as soon as we entered the water and made our decent, a large 24" long blue parrot fish began to follow us. I did not think much of it, as I always considered these peaceful coral eating fish. We covered about 250' of ground in 25 minutes. The fish constantly following us, occasionally swimming at us with its mouth open. I saw three lobster in a hole and with my tickle stick and net went to get some lunch. A few minutes latter, my daughter got my attention and showed me her forehead where the parrot fish had bitten her twice and the fish was still threatening us. I lightly poked it with my tickle stick. This had little effect. We immediately began to surface. We attempted a 3 minute safety stop at 15' but the fish continued to take runs at us with its mouth open. We surfaced about 250' from the boat. We made the surface swim being followed by the fish. Upon entering the boat the fish hovered around 20' occasionally charging us on the ladder.

Attached is a picture of the two bite marks taken several hours after the attack. The swelling had receded somewhat. Her head was the only exposed skin as we were wearing full wetsuits and gloves, something we usually do not do, but it was especially cold that day.

I have never heard of anything like this. We did nothing to harass this fish and had no food with us.


I have heard of morays, barracudas, and trigger fish occasionally bitting, but never a parrot fish chasing us over 250' of bottem and the entire water column.

 

[Capt Dave]

I've hear of a nibbled finger but nothing like this... Glad to hear your daughter is alright. I hope it dosen't discourage her from diving. Perhaps you should teach her to spearfish. Parrotfish are tasty and they started it!

Luckily, she was not rattled by the incident, she is just 14, but handled it very well. With her head bleeding from the attack, she remembered all of her training and we did a very controlled assent. I don't know that I would have been as calm.

This was her first time on this reef. She wants to go back to the same reef becuase it had some cool coral heads and we found some lobster. NOT ME.

 

[123Scuba.com]

Luckily, she was not rattled by the incident, she is just 14, but handled it very well. With her head bleeding from the attack, she remembered all of her training and we did a very controlled assent. I don't know that I would have been as calm.

This was her first time on this reef. She wants to go back to the same reef becuase it had some cool coral heads and we found some lobster. NOT ME.

Awwww come on Dad, let her dive the reef again...

Seriously though, it is excellent that she performed so well. Definately something to be proud of.

 

[vladimir]

Maybe divers have been feeding this fish?

 

[ClayJar]

Maybe divers have been feeding this fish?

One way or another, it sounds as if divers *are* feeding that fish.

(The Evil Stalking Diver-Eating Parrot Fish Of DOOOOOOM!)

 

[DandyDon]

The fish constantly following us, occasionally swimming at us with its mouth open.

Always a bad sign - from any fish or other animal. Go back to the reef with a speargun, enjoy dinner...

 

[Capt Dave]

Pretty unusual report. I've never heard of such a prolonged attack. Trigger fish are often most aggressive and will follow you relentlessly.

I agree this was very much out of the ordinary, but it was definitely not a trigger fish. If it was, I would have been more concerned from the beginning of the dive. I have been fishing and diving in the waters of South Florida for 25 years, and maintain several reef tanks. I can't be sure of the exact species of parrotfish, but it looks like either a Queen Parrotfish (Scarus vetula) or Redtail Parrotfish (Sparisoma chrysopterum). I wish we had pictures of the fish. The body was almost entirely blue, large scales, and a uniform dorsal fin that ran from just behind the eye to the tail. The teeth were somewhat solid, but had a split in the middle and small canine type ridges, which you can see in the bite marks in the picture.