By Maria Jose Gonzalez | Executive Director
The exotic Lionfish (Pterois volitans) has invaded the Mesoamerican reef. This species is a predatory venomous fish that has no natural predators in the Caribbean, so it can significantly reduce biodiversity of the local habitat. It can drive important fish species to extinction, negatively affecting the MAR reef ecosystem and reducing the income to the coastal communities that depend on sustainable fishing activities within the region.
There are several local initiatives trying to control the lionfish. However, we need to embrace it and treat it as a regional issue in order to obtain a real impact on its population management.
Attached you will find a couple of videos that are being promoted by two entities: the Healthy Reef Initiative and the Roatan Marine Park. The first one shows a technique to train MAR reef native species to eat lionfish. The second one is promoting the lionfish fillet for human consumption.
Both initiatives are very worthy as control and management strategies; but it must be clear that lionfish cannot be consider a part of the MAR reef biodiversity or an income source to its fishing communities under any circumstance. Since it’s a terrible threat not only to other fish but crustaceous, coral species and even humans, it is imperative that its population decreases as much as possible.
I take this opportunity to invite you to donate and participate during GlobalGiving Bonus Day on June 15th! During that day and only that day GlobalGiving will match all donations at 30% up to $US1,000 per donor per project. There will be funds available in matching funds only during June 15th. Only on-line donations are eligible for matching. We encourage you to made donations in early, because matching funds will likely run out before the end of the day.
Thank you very much for supproting this initiative! The fishing communities within the MAR reef and its entire ecosystem appreciatte it the most!
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