Gore, S.

Johnson, B.

Lockhart, K.

English

Aquatic Commons

 Proceedings of the 63rd Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute     November 1 - 5, 2010   San Juan, Puerto Rico 
Red Lionfish (Pterois volitans) Control Strategies in the Caribbean UK Overseas Territories 
(Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands, and Turks and Caicos) 
 
KEY WORDS:  Lionfish, Caribbean, control 
 
BRADLEY JOHNSON1*,  SHANNON GORE2, and KATHY LOCKHART3 
1 Department of Environment, P.O. Box 486, Grand Cayman KY1-1106, Cayman Islands, *bradley.johnson@gov.ky. 
2 Conservation & Fisheries Department, P. O. Box 3323, Road Town, Tortola, British Virgin Islands, VG1110. 
 3 Department of Environment and Coastal Resources, National Environmental Centre, Providenciales,  
Turks and Caicos Islands.  
 
 
El Pez León Rojo (Pterois volitans) Estrategias de Control en los Territorios de Ultramar del 
Reino Unido el Caribe (Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands y Turks y Caicos) 
 
PALABRAS CLAVE:   Pez león, Caribe, control 
 
 
Red Lionfish (Pterois volitans) Stratégies de Lutte dans les Territoires d'outre-Mer des Caraïbes 
au Royaume-Uni (Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands et Turks et Caicos) 
 
MOTS CLÉS:  Rascasses volantes, Caraïbe, stratégies de lutte  
 
ABSTRACT 
The Red Lionfish (Pterois volitans), native to the Indian and Pacific Oceans, has invaded the Western Atlantic and 
more recently the Caribbean.  While the lionfish has biological characteristics that provide advantages over native Atlantic 
fish species, and which predisposes it to rapid proliferation, most countries in the region lack the human and financial 
resources to effectively control this new invader.  In 2009, the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) offered 
financial assistance to the Cayman Islands, British Virgin Islands, and Turks and Caicos jointly to assist in their control 
efforts on this invasive species. In the Cayman Islands, the responsibility for conservation of marine resources lies with the 
Cayman Islands Department of Environment.  The Departments efforts on lionfish control are focused on conservation 
management, research, raising public awareness, equipment, and volunteer training.  This paper will highlight key elements 
of the efforts currently underway in the Cayman Islands with further examples from the British Virgin Islands and Turks 
and Caicos. 
 
INTRODUCTION 
The lionfish invasion reached the Caribbean in 2004.  Specifically, the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) in November 
2007, the Cayman Islands (Cayman) in February 2008, and the British Virgin Islands (BVI) in March 2010.  These are three 
of the five British Overseas Territories (BOT’s) in the Caribbean, and in November 2009, in response to this new threat the 
JNCC offered financial assistance to these three countries of ₤20,000 each to assist in their control efforts.  This funding 
was put to use in different ways in each of the countries since each is at a different stage of the invasion.  BVI has just 
started to see lionfish, so their sightings are few and far between, and sizes are relatively small.  The Cayman Islands are 
further along with regular sightings and significantly larger fish, and TCI is the most advanced of the three.  Control 
strategies will be examined for each country with respect to how the JNCC funding has contributed to their advancement. 
 
British Virgin Islands 
Since the BVI is at the beginning stages of the invasion, the most important aspect is to ensure all sightings are 
reported, and an effective and efficient removal process is in place.  To aid with this they have adopted a marker system 
where divers are given small weighted floats made from wine corks that are easily carried and deployed when a lionfish is 
sighted.  The sighting is reported and a trained culler will visit the site, locate the marker indicating the presence of a 
lionfish, then collect the fish and remove the marker so as not to leave any debris on the reef.  A campaign was started to 
have wine corks donated, and in the first week over 7,000 were received!  This marker system was employed in Cayman as 
well, but with the population becoming so large, it is no longer necessary to report sightings or leave markers as this was 
creating unnecessary debris on the reef and there were so many reports that not all were being responded to. 
As in all countries dealing with the lionfish, a huge part of the response is in raising public awareness about the 
invasion, and this is no different for any of these three BOT’s.  The main goal is to get people aware of the problem, 
Page 332  63rd Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute  
 
including its venomous nature, and to be on the look-out 
for lionfish.  BVI are asking that only trained responders 
attempt to collect the fish, since they are easily spooked 
and are very difficult to capture afterwards.  These 
responders do not need special licensing, though their 
counterparts in TCI and Cayman need to be licensed to 
enter any MPA. 
Training of personnel is also a high priority as proper 
capture technique and first aid treatment is critical to 
ensure safety.  BVI have met with the Caribbean Oceanic 
Restoration and Education (CORE) Foundation’s Joe Gulli 
as well as officials from the USVI for training whereas TCI 
and Cayman have participated in REEF’s training and 
education program.  
Taking the message to the people is also on the 
agenda, and visits to schools and businesses are a regular 
part of the control program in all three countries.  Since the 
most effective way to get peoples attention is to show them 
an actual lionfish, these visits either include a live fish or a 
preserved specimen, both of which generate lots of 
discussion. 
Having the right equipment for the job is essential, and 
BVI benefitted by being able to use the JNCC funding to 
purchase 40 sets of capture gear and donate them to their 
first responders.  The capture gear includes one pair of Hex
-Armor puncture proof gloves, one dry bag, and a pair of 
clear vinyl collection nets.  TCI and Cayman had already 
purchased capture gear since they had both been dealing 
with the invasion for sometime before, but were able to 
purchase additional sets as well as other tools with the 
funding. 
 
Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) 
With TCI having larger lionfish and more of them than 
Cayman and BVI, they were already at the stage where 
control by culling was not enough to reduce the impact on 
the reef.  TCI are promoting them as a food item and trying 
to get as many locals to start eating them as possible.  To 
this end they are focusing a large part of their resources on 
tasting events anywhere from supermarkets to public 
functions and one restaurant is even making lionfish pizza. 
They have also started a Restaurant Initiative to assist in 
this promotion and have setup monthly workshops to 
educate chefs on how to prepare the fish and promote it in 
their menus.  Cayman is almost at the stage where the fish 
are large enough to support a food fishery, so the promo-
tion has started by using the catch from tournaments to 
serve as appetizers at the prize giving.  This has proven 
extremely successful and is becoming a standard at all the 
tournaments. 
There was some hesitation from the commercial 
fishermen to start capturing the lionfish, mainly due to the 
venom in the spines, so effort was made to show local 
fishers how to safely clean the fish and that they were safe 
to eat as well.  A year long tournament was started in 
October 2009 with the grand prize of $3,000 going to the 
first person to catch 3,000 fish, but unfortunately, that 
tournament had to be cancelled shortly afterwards.  
 
Cayman Islands (Cayman) 
When lionfish first showed up in Cayman, there was 
already knowledge of their impact on other reef ecosys-
tems, so there was already plans underway to gain the 
proper training and expertise necessary to establish an 
effective management program.  REEF was contracted to 
assist with developing this program which started in March 
2009.  It was necessary to license individuals to catch 
lionfish since there were laws in place which prevented 
them from effectively catching lionfish.  In order to 
become licensed it, was necessary to attend a short course, 
which was developed by REEF, which gave the applicant 
as much knowledge about the lionfish as possible.  After 
completing this course the licensed culler could now: take 
lionfish while on SCUBA; take lionfish from Marine Parks 
and Replenishment Zones (two types of MPA’s); wear 
gloves while catching lionfish; and catch lionfish under 
eight inches total length.  No lionfish were to be kept alive, 
and no spearing devices were to be used, the preferred 
capture technique was the clear vinyl nets. 
There was a tremendous response from the public to 
get involved with this program, and over 600 people have 
been licensed through November 2010.  Residents 
participated mainly because it gave them a sense of 
purpose on their dives and a sense of enjoyment.  It also 
helped to raise environmental awareness with certain 
sectors that may not have been as keen to get involved in 
other projects simply because of the obvious impact the 
lionfish has on our reefs. 
The dive companies were the strongest supporters of 
the control program from the beginning even without any 
appropriate capture gear.  Innovative capture techniques 
were found using materials ranging from 2-gallon Ziploc 
bags to mask boxes to bed comforter bags.  As the lionfish 
invasion continued, the dive companies began having 
problems with their techniques, even after the proper 
capture gear was purchased.  There were more and more 
fish showing up, and they were getting larger and harder to 
catch in the nets.  This was compounded with the time and 
depth constraints of diving and proved that the current 
capture technique was no longer practical.  The nets were 
also very bulky to carry, and there was a responsibility to 
their paying customers first which very often prevented 
them from culling as often as they needed to.  
To this end, they made a formal request to the 
Department of Environment (DoE) to allow them to cull 
using pole spears.  This was a very difficult decision to 
make because spear guns and such like have been heavily 
controlled for years with the intention to eventually ban 
spear fishing completely.  Currently, all spear guns have to 
be licensed, it is illegal to import spear guns and parts and 
the legal definition of a spear gun includes pole spears and 
a range of other devices.  With no other practical solution 
   Johnson, B.  et al.  GCFI:63   (2011) Page 333 
 
to the problem the DoE agreed to license the dive compa-
nies to spear lionfish with special pole spears that had to be 
manufactured locally and attached the following conditions 
to the license:  
i) Only dive staff that are already licensed cullers 
may use the spears, 
ii) Only DoE issued pole spears may be used 
iii) Staff are only allowed to spear while leading 
dives, and 
iv) Each pole spear will be tagged and licensed to one 
company and boat. 
 
Each company will provide DoE with a list of all employed 
licensed cullers 
This program is working well, and there are plans to 
expand the spearing program to residents who are actively 
culling and supplying catch data to DoE.  There are also 
plans in place to hold culls supervised by DoE where the 
spears remain with DoE after the cull.  The manufactured 
pole spears did have some draw backs, and DoE is now 
looking into obtaining permission to import professionally 
manufactured pole spears from a company in the United 
States. 
Culling tournaments are becoming a popular method 
to raise awareness on the lionfish issue and help reduce 
their population on reefs.  The DoE has taken a position to 
assist private companies who are interested in organizing 
culling tournaments by creating official Tournament 
Guidelines and acting in an advisory role overseeing the 
weigh-ins and training chefs on safe handling practices for 
preparing lionfish to serve.  This position requires less time 
from DoE, as there is no involvement with the background 
organizational work leading up to the tournament but still 
allows them to obtain all catch data. 
The first tournament was held on September 4th &5th, 
and with about 100 participants, over 500 lionfish were 
caught in those two days.  The prize giving on the 6th was 
equally successful with Mezza Restaurant serving lionfish 
to the participants as fritters, chowder, fingers, and pan 
seared. 
All three countries are actively pursuing various 
methods of dealing with the lionfish invasion, and each 
must work within their own legislation to create a program 
that is sustainable and that does not endanger other areas of 
the reef ecosystem while controlling lionfish. 
 
  
 
 
 


Red Lionfish (Pterois volitans) Control Strategies in the Caribbean UK Overseas Territories (Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands, and Turks and Caicos).

http://aquaticcommons.org/21263/1/GCFI_63-65.pdf

Red Lionfish (Pterois volitans) Control Strategies in the Caribbean UK Overseas Territories (Cayman Islands, Virgin Islands, and Turks and Caicos).

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