# Lionfish habitat depths



## pcfisher22

How shallow are you guys finding these lionfish? I mainly fish the livebottom in 50-70' of water. Are they highly populated in these depths or mainly over 100'?


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## Firefishvideo

We see larger numbers in over 70'.
Most of our natural sites are in 100-120 feet....so I'm not sure of the shallower natural sites.
Bridge rubble in 70-80 foot of water seems to hold plenty of them.....so I would imagine natural would as well.


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## pcfisher22

Do you find a difference in numbers depending on the height of the structure?


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## Firefishvideo

pcfisher22 said:


> Do you find a difference in numbers depending on the height of the structure?


They seem to like being a foot or so off the bottom.....near a hole or a ledge that they can duck into.

I don't think the height of the structure makes any difference to them.
We do find some of them tucked into the openings along the top of the pyramids.....but most of them are closer to the bottom.

Here are a couple of my videos that show how they are concentrated on the reef.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHbdEXJD748
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nk_GNLbES_U


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## WhackUmStackUm

pcfisher22 said:


> How shallow are you guys finding these lionfish? I mainly fish the livebottom in 50-70' of water. Are they highly populated in these depths or mainly over 100'?


Most of my dives are over 150' deep. However, I have seen many lionfish on my shallowest dives (85') and at all deeper depths. There are plenty of lionfish on The Edge at 180'. 

I have the same experience as firefishvideo. The highest concentration of lionfish are to be found within a few feet of the bottom, independent of height of the structure's relief. However, I often find lionfish at all levels, even on tall structures such as the Chevron and Tenneco reefs.


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## El Kabong

In parts of Florida where there is shallow reef, I've seen them in 12ft of water.

Around here, I've seen them from 60-175ft deep (the deepest I go). I'll echo Whack and Fire's comments about seeing more near the bottom, but I also find significant numbers on the tops of wrecks and reef modules. It may be that there's more square-footage on the bottom, or that they just like being close to the sand, I couldn't say.

Water temp will be a deciding factor in the cooler months. They move to deeper (warmer) water when you get temps below 60 degrees (they stop eating around 55, and die around 50). Now that the water's getting warmer, they're moving back in to the shallower (less than 100ft) waters.


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## BILL MONEY

were in 3000 ft of water nad the diver i tlaked to today said he saw a few around the platform legs where they are pulling in a new flowline riser... we have tendrels that extend to the seafloor but they are just pipes till you get to the floating "structure"..


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## FenderBender

BILL MONEY said:


> were in 3000 ft of water nad the diver i tlaked to today said he saw a few around the platform legs where they are pulling in a new flowline riser... we have tendrels that extend to the seafloor but they are just pipes till you get to the floating "structure"..





Just curious, what diving contractor is out there doing the work?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## BILL MONEY

Aquios... I'm on Ursa TLP... be here till next tuesday then headed home for 2 weeks ... ready to get on the water for fun ...


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## capt mike

*Lionfish! Chicken Little-" The sky is falling"!*

I appreciate all the people "thinking they have this intrusion on our fisheries" figured out! What you people FAIL to realize is the lion fish has already done its best to eradicate fishing in the Bahamas, the keys, and ALL the southern Caribbean! It never happened! Wake up people! We have a population of bottom dwellers that have never been even considered to exist in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. The reef populations are sustainable even if the lionfish exists! You people are embarrassing to me. I hear from the nay sayers "everyday" this will devastate the fishery! Wake up people! The NMFS is much more devastating than any threat to our fishery that EXISTS! All I can say is- Wake the **** up!
All the divers God Bless You! You people are trying to figure out how to eradicate this species- Guess what- You won't! Lets get real people-divers-tree huggers and fishermen and women. The lionfish is here to stay for the foreseeable future. But the SKY isn't falling -if thats true The Keys, Bahamas, and the southern  wouldn't have the fishery they STILL have!


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## flappininthebreeze

*Lionfish*

You seem to be ignoring the fact all those places are years ahead of the central gulf states in their own, active, and very successful Lionfish mitigation efforts. The Cayman Islands have been especially successful. Please note, NOT by denying the problem, poo pooing those who are trying to spin up the effort here, or feigning embarrassment at the good work of others who are willing to get off their collective butts and try. If you're not doing anything yourself, you should be embarrassed. It ain't figured out, but folks are trying. When your secret spots drop off in productivity, just let one of the problem solvers know. They'll be happy to ride out with ya, film the hundreds of Lionfish covering your spots, and eating all the baitfish in site. They'll even clean the LF off for ya. FireFish knows what im talking about. All the places you mention took their hit, pulled their heads out of their ..., well out of the sand, and went after the Lionfish. Their fisheries are hanging on, or recovering, we're just getting started. Thank goodness we are getting on it here. Glad we didn't wait on you. 


capt mike said:


> I appreciate all the people "thinking they have this intrusion on our fisheries" figured out! What you people FAIL to realize is the lion fish has already done its best to eradicate fishing in the Bahamas, the keys, and ALL the southern Caribbean! It never happened! Wake up people! We have a population of bottom dwellers that have never been even considered to exist in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. The reef populations are sustainable even if the lionfish exists! You people are embarrassing to me. I hear from the nay sayers "everyday" this will devastate the fishery! Wake up people! The NMFS is much more devastating than any threat to our fishery that EXISTS! All I can say is- Wake the **** up!
> All the divers God Bless You! You people are trying to figure out how to eradicate this species- Guess what- You won't! Lets get real people-divers-tree huggers and fishermen and women. The lionfish is here to stay for the foreseeable future. But the SKY isn't falling -if thats true The Keys, Bahamas, and the southern  wouldn't have the fishery they STILL have!


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## El Kabong

flappininthebreeze said:


> You seem to be ignoring the fact all those places are years ahead of the central gulf states in their own, active, and very successful Lionfish mitigation efforts. The Cayman Islands have been especially successful. Please note, NOT by denying the problem, poo pooing those who are trying to spin up the effort here, or feigning embarrassment at the good work of others who are willing to get off their collective butts and try. If you're not doing anything yourself, you should be embarrassed. It ain't figured out, but folks are trying. When your secret spots drop off in productivity, just let one of the problem solvers know. They'll be happy to ride out with ya, film the hundreds of Lionfish covering your spots, and eating all the baitfish in site. They'll even clean the LF off for ya. FireFish knows what im talking about. All the places you mention took their hit, pulled their heads out of their ..., well out of the sand, and went after the Lionfish. Their fisheries are hanging on, or recovering, we're just getting started. Thank goodness we are getting on it here. Glad we didn't wait on you.


+1

The problem you will soon figure out is that unlike on a coral or limestone reef, the small critters that maintain the health of your artificial reefs, have literally nowhere to hide from the lionfish. They'll strip your pyramids and reef balls, and decrease species diversity by greater than 80%.

I can clean your reef tomorrow, and the fish will be back in a week. If I cleaned every reef in recreational depths, the loop currents would simply deliver another generation of baby lionfish, and you'd start over from scratch.

Don't believe this at your own peril.

None of us that have done any amount of diving in the gulf believe that eradication is possible, but if we fail to mitigate, the fishermen and their families will be the first to suffer, not me.

Last weekend, 23 divers brought in 1,914 lionfish. Almost 100% of those fish came from public reefs. I "wasted" dives hitting about 10 spots that someone had already cleaned out. Imagine what all those unpublished pyramids and chicken coops look like?


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## Firefishvideo

El Kabong said:


> . Imagine what all those unpublished pyramids and chicken coops look like?


YEP! They look like this:


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## sealark

capt mike said:


> I appreciate all the people "thinking they have this intrusion on our fisheries" figured out! What you people FAIL to realize is the lion fish has already done its best to eradicate fishing in the Bahamas, the keys, and ALL the southern Caribbean! It never happened! Wake up people! We have a population of bottom dwellers that have never been even considered to exist in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. The reef populations are sustainable even if the lionfish exists! You people are embarrassing to me. I hear from the nay sayers "everyday" this will devastate the fishery! Wake up people! The NMFS is much more devastating than any threat to our fishery that EXISTS! All I can say is- Wake the **** up!
> All the divers God Bless You! You people are trying to figure out how to eradicate this species- Guess what- You won't! Lets get real people-divers-tree huggers and fishermen and women. The lionfish is here to stay for the foreseeable future. But the SKY isn't falling -if thats true The Keys, Bahamas, and the southern  wouldn't have the fishery they STILL have!


+1 :thumbup::thumbup: The Red Sea is another area lionfish survive and co exist much longer than here.


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## snake 166

Not the same scenario here as south fl. Sparse reefs are oasis supporting very high fish densities----seem especially suited to lionfish site preference. This is a big deal and not one easily solved by fishing effort---spear or otherwise.


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## snake 166

Lionfish are native to the Pacific and over time evolved predator/prey relations that lead to stable populations---not so here. Will likely see surges and die offs as they overpopulate and overexploit our reefs. I think natural controls---like parasites or disease should be looked at but is also risky. Traps should also be research if they can be designed to be lionfish specific.


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## El Kabong

snake 166 said:


> Not the same scenario here as south fl. Sparse reefs are oasis supporting very high fish densities----seem especially suited to lionfish site preference. This is a big deal and not one easily solved by fishing effort---spear or otherwise.


+1

They're comparing apples and oranges. I've been diving all three costs of South Florida for years, and they just don't have the numbers that we have here. They never have, and it's not even close. Not even close.

A better habitat comparison would be North and South Carolina, though, they still don't have the artificial reef system that we have in Orange Beach/Pensacola, and their waters get colder, and stay colder longer, which is a limiting factor because lionfish stop eating and reproducing at 55°, and keel over at 50°.

Unfortunately, water temp is the only thing Pensacola has going for it. We see the lionfish move off the inshore dive sites in the Winter, but juveniles, and full-sized (15"+) fish are back the minute the water warms back up.

The deeper waters we have 20 miles offshore stays warmer at the bottom, and they just hang out there until the dinner bell rings in March/April.



snake 166 said:


> Lionfish are native to the Pacific and over time evolved predator/prey relations that lead to stable populations---not so here. Will likely see surges and die offs as they overpopulate and overexploit our reefs. I think natural controls---like parasites or disease should be looked at but is also risky. Traps should also be research if they can be designed to be lionfish specific.


Traps have been developed, but you have to tend them, or you'll lose other species. There is at least one group working on a trap that would be designed specifically for lionfish.

There's also research into the effectiveness of releasing sterile males into the population. They would fertilize eggs with blanks, and then they would never hatch.


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## snake 166

Thanks EK. I contacted the biologists at Biscayne Bay National Park and was told they have a graduate student working on trap design---would have results to report in 4-5 months. What works down there may not work here---so a program should be funded and conducted by FWC or others on trap design and evaluation in our waters.

Hope this problem is as simple as die off in low temperature. This year should be a test with sustained low temps in Jan.


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## El Kabong

snake 166 said:


> Hope this problem is as simple as die off in low temperature. This year should be a test with sustained low temps in Jan.


I think the temps just keep it from being worse than it is. All the inshore spots that were empty of lionfish in the Winter, are now stacked up with lionfish, juveniles and adults. 

Those adults moved from a warmer spot. They didn't turn into 15" adults in a month or two.

The good news is that that tournament knocked those numbers back. I think we can have a positive effect if we keep up the effort to kill what we can.


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## DLo

capt mike said:


> I appreciate all the people "thinking they have this intrusion on our fisheries" figured out! What you people FAIL to realize is the lion fish has already done its best to eradicate fishing in the Bahamas, the keys, and ALL the southern Caribbean! It never happened! Wake up people! We have a population of bottom dwellers that have never been even considered to exist in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. The reef populations are sustainable even if the lionfish exists! You people are embarrassing to me. I hear from the nay sayers "everyday" this will devastate the fishery! Wake up people! The NMFS is much more devastating than any threat to our fishery that EXISTS! All I can say is- Wake the **** up!
> All the divers God Bless You! You people are trying to figure out how to eradicate this species- Guess what- You won't! Lets get real people-divers-tree huggers and fishermen and women. The lionfish is here to stay for the foreseeable future. But the SKY isn't falling -if thats true The Keys, Bahamas, and the southern  wouldn't have the fishery they STILL have!


I too have found that the best way to sell your point of view to folks is to insult and attempt to talk down to them, throw in some cursing, a healthy dose of sarcasm and call their intelligence into question and BAM, they'll be right on board in no time. You nailed it with this post, congrats. :thumbsup:


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## billin

*lion fish*

I am attempting to catch them on rod and reel for fun. ant and all suggestions would be appreciated. 
so far I have established they are docile hang very close to structure and don't stray away from it. however what are they eating? I have tried several different baits. I plan to try Glass minnows next any other helpful suggestions?


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## Billybob+

It's probably not the bait you're using, but rather the type of predator that they are. They are a passive predator much like a Flounder and you're gonna have to get your bait very near them to catch them. If you look at the picture earlier in this thread it clearly demonstrates that the lionfish, in large, hang out immediately in and around the structure they're holding on. Don't fish for them like Snapper or trigger, get your bait on the bottom (they aren't gonna come up in the water column after it) and get it ON THIER NOSE, (they aren't gonna swim out after it)



billin said:


> I am attempting to catch them on rod and reel for fun. ant and all suggestions would be appreciated.
> so far I have established they are docile hang very close to structure and don't stray away from it. however what are they eating? I have tried several different baits. I plan to try Glass minnows next any other helpful suggestions?


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## billin

*billy*

thanks I plan to give it a go this week I will post results


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## tibiasterrible

DLo said:


> I too have found that the best way to sell your point of view to folks is to insult and attempt to talk down to them, throw in some cursing, a healthy dose of sarcasm and call their intelligence into question and BAM, they'll be right on board in no time. You nailed it with this post, congrats. :thumbsup:


 
Glad yall cleared this up for us. Ill have to work on my Insulting skills. LOL


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## WhackUmStackUm

capt mike said:


> ...What you people FAIL to realize is the lion fish has already done its best to eradicate fishing in the Bahamas, the keys, and ALL the southern Caribbean! It never happened! Wake up people! ...the SKY isn't falling -if thats true The Keys, Bahamas, and the southern  wouldn't have the fishery they STILL have!


A few articles on actual lionfish damage. Google for more.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080717164319.htm
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111695369
http://sites.duke.edu/aquaticinvasives/tag/red-lionfish/
http://www.undercurrent.org/blog/2010/06/30/the-great-lionfish-invasion-what-is-the-threat/


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## osborne311

billin said:


> thanks I plan to give it a go this week I will post results


 Very interested in what you find. If anyone can figure out how to successfully target with rod and reel I would like to know.

Thanks


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## El Kabong

billin said:


> I am attempting to catch them on rod and reel for fun. ant and all suggestions would be appreciated.
> so far I have established they are docile hang very close to structure and don't stray away from it. however what are they eating? I have tried several different baits. I plan to try Glass minnows next any other helpful suggestions?





osborne311 said:


> Very interested in what you find. If anyone can figure out how to successfully target with rod and reel I would like to know.


I've had good luck catching bait-stealers with a 2/0 circle hook. I'd try hitting a pyramid or tank with a live minnow on a 2/0 circle. You'll need to get him on the bottom, and as close to the structure as possible.

I have no idea if they'll take cut bait or shrimp, but I do know they eat juvenile lobster, so perhaps a live shrimp would work too.


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## Eastern Tackle

Here is a video of lionfish @ 1000ft in the bahamas. As I recall they said there were tons of them at 400ft.

http://youtu.be/kOHeFoIRW-g


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## WhackUmStackUm

I have heard that they can be caught on squid. I would also try small live baitfish or crabs on the bottom with small hooks. I do see large lionfish away from reefs from time to time but the majority of them stick close to cover.

Here is a picture of a lionfish we speared that had a hook in its mouth.


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## sealark

Bryan, suggestion to get fish to consume lionfish, make a dive and kill a bunch of lionfish clip the spines with sissors, put them back down on a rod and reel. I would bet after those sn & gr get use to the spines they would start killing live ones and build up ammunity to the protein toxin. Again helping mother nature along because no one will ever change it.


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## WhackUmStackUm

sealark said:


> Bryan, suggestion to get fish to consume lionfish, make a dive and kill a bunch of lionfish clip the spines with sissors, put them back down on a rod and reel. I would bet after those sn & gr get use to the spines they would start killing live ones and build up ammunity to the protein toxin. Again helping mother nature along because no one will ever change it.


That is an interesting idea. It may also make sense to use clipped lionfish as bait on hook-and line when fishing for larger species.

I have been stung a lot, and the stings seem to be affecting me less and less.


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