You know that lionfish are now part of the ecosystem as they fill the void by the overfished groupers, snappers and other predatory fish. It is well known among scientists that once an an invasive species becomes established it becomes part of the ecosystem and when they are removed it disturbs the balance of that ecosystem. Having large numbers of lionfish means that there are large numbers of fish that are reproducing and that means that the ecosystem is healthy because lionfish would die off if the the native fish populations were declining. If divers could relax and let nature take its course then things would achieve balance. Of the Caribbean reefs undisturbed by man, there are many lionfish but also many other species of fish present. Of the Caribbean reefs that are disturbed by man there are far less fish overall and the coral is unhealthy. So for this reason I believe that man is far more destructive the the Caribbean coral reefs than the lionfish.
I agree with this partially....Because Sharks and the other top level predators have been wiped out by commercial fishing, the mid and low level predators exploded, and have wiped out many of the herbivores--this allowing huge algal growths on many reefs...this killing the reef corals, and ultimate destroying the entire reef habitat.
The Lionfish are assisting in the balancing of many of the species that overpopulated due to no higher predators remaining---but are not discriminating enough to be entirely a useful solution short term..Moreover, because there is still very little predation on Lionfish ( only a tiny bit by Jewfish or sharks), they SHOULD NOT BE just left alone --they would overpopulate without any balance potential, and would then eat all the fish, not just the over-populated low and mid level predators in juvenile form.
Where we see as many Lionfish as the plane, I think "harvesting commerically" would be good for the balance, and also take some pressure off of spearfisherman shooting hogsnappers for the big bucks...the restaurants will likely pay as much per pound for Lionfish as for hogfish. I would rather see 6 more of the hogfish like DD shot ( as I may have
and 1/4 of the Lionfish left to swim around....
As to the sustainability of the Lionfish, on the Race to the Bottom of the Sea project I was on 2 weeks ago, a sub driver for one of the Triton subs was at around 900 feet by some reef, and said it was covered in Lionfish!!! In other words, there will always be a "re-charge zone" for Lionfish, even if they become commercially viable....No one will be buying 20 million dollar subs to go 1000 feet down with to shoot a dozen lion fish with each dive
