The vicious red lionfish might not be getting enough credit for its predator status, the fish are wiping out local marine populations and even sharks and have not been able to wipe them out.
Lionfish are impacting the population of local Caribbean sea-life, and human intervention may be the only way to stop them, a ScienceDaily press release reported.
"Lionfish are here to stay, and it appears that the only way to control them is by fishing them," John Bruno, professor of biology in UNC's College of Arts and Sciences and lead investigator of the study, said.
The massacre is not only happening in the Caribbean, lionfish are wiping out local populations across the North Carolina coast as well.
Lionfish are popular in aquariums, but their poisonous spines make them unappealing to hungry predators and people. Humans do eat the fish sometimes if the spines have been removed.
The fish have about 18 "needle-like" dorsal fins which are used as a deadly defense, National Geographic reported. The sting from one of the toxic spines can cause extreme pain, nausea, and breathing problems in humans.
Marine experts are concerned the lionfish could be a threat to wildlife populations, according to ScienceDaily.
"When I began diving 10 years ago, lionfish were a rare and mysterious species seen deep within coral crevices in the Pacific Ocean," Serena Hackerott, lead author of the study and master's student in marine sciences, said. "They can now been seen across the Caribbean, hovering above the reefs throughout the day and gathering in groups of up to ten or more on a single coral head."
Scientists looked for signs larger predators would wipe out some of the lionfish by preying on them or competing for food, but there didn't seem to be an effect on the population. They also looked for signs overfishing may have wiped out some of the spiny predators.
The team looked at 71 reefs in different regions around the Caribbean, but did not find a connection between the population size of lionfish and how many predators were present.
Protected reefs had a lower population of lionfish, but the researchers believe it is a result of manual removal by managers.
Since the protected reefs seemed to be safer from the voracious fish, the team suggested human intervention to keep the population in check.
"Active and direct management, perhaps in the form of sustained culling, appears to be essential to curbing local lionfish abundance and efforts to promote such activities should be encouraged," the study said.
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