Impacts of pollution on coastal and marine ecosystems including coastal and marine fisheries and approach for management: a review and synthesis.

This paper presents the output of our fifth annual horizon-scanning exercise, which aims to identify topics that increasingly may affect conservation of biological diversity, but have yet to be widely considered. A team of professional horizon scanners, researchers, practitioners, and a journalist identified 15 topics which were identified via an iterative, Delphi-like process. The 15 topics include a carbon market induced financial crash, rapid geographic expansion of macroalgal cultivation, genetic control of invasive species, probiotic therapy for amphibians, and an emerging snake fungal disease.

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Horizon scan of global conservation issues for 2011

The Indo-Pacific lionfish Pterois volitans, introduced to Florida waters in the early 1990s, is currently spreading rapidly throughout the Caribbean region This invasive carnivore may cause deleterious changes in coral-reef ecosystems via predation on native fishes and invertebrates as well as competition with native predators We conducted a controlled field experiment using a matrix of translocated coral and artificial patch reefs to examine the short-term effects of lionfish on the recruit- ment of native reef fishes in the Bahamas Lionfish caused significant reductions in the recruitment of native fishes by an average of 79% over the 5 wk duration of the experiment This strong effect on a key life stage of coral-reef fishes suggests that invasive lionfish are already having substantial nega- tive impacts on Atlantic coral reefs While complete eradication of lionfish in the Atlantic is likely impossible, it would be prudent to initiate focused lionfish control efforts in strategic locations

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Invasive Indo-Pacific lionfish Pterois volitans reduce recruitment of Atlantic coral-reef fishes

Feeding ecology of the lionfish (Pterois volitans), an invasive species in the Western North Atlantic, was examined by collecting stomach content data from fishes taken throughout the Bahamian archipelago. Three relative metrics of prey quantity, including percent number, percent frequency, and percent volume, were used to compare three indices of dietary importance. Lionfish largely prey upon teleosts (78% volume) and crustaceans (14% volume). Twenty-one families and 41 species of teleosts were represented in the diet of lionfish; the top 10 families of dietary importance were Gobiidae, Labridae, Gram- matidae, Apogonidae, Pomacentridae, Serranidae, Blenniidae, Atherinidae, Mullidae, and Monacanthi- dae. The proportional importance of crustaceans in the diet was inversely related to size with the largest lionfish preying almost exclusively on teleosts. Lion- fish were found to be diurnal feeders with the highest predation occurring in the morning (08:00-11:00).

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Feeding ecology of invasive lionfish (Pterois volitans) in the Bahamian archipelago

Nonindigenous fishes introduced into inland waters of the United States /; Pam L. Fuller, Leo G. Nico, James D. Williams.

The occurrence of lionfish Pterois volitans is reported from the western Atlantic Ocean. Adults were collected off the coasts of North Carolina, Georgia and Florida, and juveniles were collected along the shore of Long Island, New York. They have also been found around Bermuda. Lionfish are indigenous to tropical waters of the western Pacific and their occurrence along the east coast of the United States represents a human-induced introduction. Distribution of adults suggests lionfish are surviving in the western Atlantic and capture of juveniles provides putative evidence of reproduction. The most likely pathway of introduction is aquarium releases, but introduction via ballast water cannot be ruled out. The ecosystem of the southeastern United States continental shelf is already undergoing change: reef fish communities are becoming more tropical and many fish species are overfished. These ongoing changes, along with limited information regarding the biology of P. volitans, make predictions of long-term effects of the introduction difficult. This discovery rep- resents the first, apparently successful introduction, of a marine fish from the western Pacific to Atlantic coastal waters of the United States.

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Todd Gardner

Papers

Biological invasion of the Indo-Pacific lionfish Pterois volitans along the Atlantic coast of North America