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      Habitat-Specific Density and Diet of Rapidly Expanding Invasive Red Lionfish, Pterois volitans, Populations in the Northern Gulf of Mexico

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          Abstract

          Invasive Indo-Pacific red lionfish, Pterois volitans, were first reported in the northern Gulf of Mexico (nGOM) in summer 2010. To examine potential impacts on native reef fish communities, lionfish density and size distributions were estimated from fall 2010 to fall 2013 with a remotely operated vehicle at natural (n = 16) and artificial (n = 22) reef sites. Lionfish (n = 934) also were sampled via spearfishing to examine effects of habitat type, season, and fish size on their diet and trophic ecology. There was an exponential increase in lionfish density at both natural and artificial reefs over the study period. By fall 2013, mean lionfish density at artificial reefs (14.7 fish 100 m −2) was two orders of magnitude higher than at natural reefs (0.49 fish 100 m −2), and already was among the highest reported in the western Atlantic. Lionfish diet was significantly different among habitats, seasons, and size classes, with smaller (<250 mm total length) fish consuming more benthic invertebrates and the diet of lionfish sampled from artificial reefs being composed predominantly of non-reef associated prey. The ontogenetic shift in lionfish feeding ecology was consistent with δ 15N values of white muscle tissue that were positively related to total length. Overall, diet results indicate lionfish are generalist mesopredators in the nGOM that become more piscivorous at larger size. However, lionfish diet was much more varied at artificial reef sites where they clearly were foraging on open substrates away from reef structure. These results have important implications for tracking the lionfish invasion in the nGOM, as well as estimating potential direct and indirect impacts on native reef fish communities in this region.

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          Most cited references8

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          Species diversity and biological invasions: relating local process to community pattern.

          J M Levine (2000)
          In a California riparian system, the most diverse natural assemblages are the most invaded by exotic plants. A direct in situ manipulation of local diversity and a seed addition experiment showed that these patterns emerge despite the intrinsic negative effects of diversity on invasions. The results suggest that species loss at small scales may reduce invasion resistance. At community-wide scales, the overwhelming effects of ecological factors spatially covarying with diversity, such as propagule supply, make the most diverse communities most likely to be invaded.
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            Invasive Lionfish Drive Atlantic Coral Reef Fish Declines

            Indo-Pacific lionfish (Pterois volitans and P. miles) have spread swiftly across the Western Atlantic, producing a marine predator invasion of unparalleled speed and magnitude. There is growing concern that lionfish will affect the structure and function of invaded marine ecosystems, however detrimental impacts on natural communities have yet to be measured. Here we document the response of native fish communities to predation by lionfish populations on nine coral reefs off New Providence Island, Bahamas. We assessed lionfish diet through stomach contents analysis, and quantified changes in fish biomass through visual surveys of lionfish and native fishes at the sites over time. Lionfish abundance increased rapidly between 2004 and 2010, by which time lionfish comprised nearly 40% of the total predator biomass in the system. The increase in lionfish abundance coincided with a 65% decline in the biomass of the lionfish's 42 Atlantic prey fishes in just two years. Without prompt action to control increasing lionfish populations, similar effects across the region may have long-term negative implications for the structure of Atlantic marine communities, as well as the societies and economies that depend on them.
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              Progress in invasion biology: predicting invaders.

              Predicting which species are probable invaders has been a long-standing goal of ecologists, but only recently have quantitative methods been used to achieve such a goal. Although restricted to few taxa, these studies reveal clear relationships between the characteristics of releases and the species involved, and the successful establishment and spread of invaders. For example, the probability of bird establishment increases with the number of individuals released and the number of release events. Also, the probability of plant invasiveness increases if the species has a history of invasion and reproduces vegetatively. These promising quantitative approaches should be more widely applied to allow us to predict patterns of invading species more successfully.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Role: Editor
                Journal
                PLoS One
                PLoS ONE
                plos
                plosone
                PLoS ONE
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, USA )
                1932-6203
                2014
                29 August 2014
                : 9
                : 8
                : e105852
                Affiliations
                [1]University of South Alabama, Department of Marine Sciences, Mobile, Alabama, United States of America
                North Carolina State University, United States of America
                Author notes

                Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

                Conceived and designed the experiments: WFP KAD. Performed the experiments: KAD. Analyzed the data: KAD WFP. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: WFP. Contributed to the writing of the manuscript: KAD WFP.

                Article
                PONE-D-14-23557
                10.1371/journal.pone.0105852
                4149477
                25170922
                a36735d8-a322-4e50-bc82-23648e0f1459
                Copyright @ 2014

                This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

                History
                : 29 May 2014
                : 26 July 2014
                Page count
                Pages: 13
                Funding
                This research was made possible in part by a grant from BP/The Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, Florida Institute of Oceanography Block Grant, and GoMRI Center for the Integrated Modeling and Analysis of the Gulf Ecosystem ( http://gulfresearchinitiative.org/). Funding for this study was also received in part from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, Grant FWC-08304 ( http://myfwc.com/research/). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
                Categories
                Research Article
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Ecology
                Community Ecology
                Trophic Interactions
                Population Biology
                Population Dynamics
                Predator-Prey Dynamics
                Population Metrics
                Population Density
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Species Colonization
                Invasive Species
                Custom metadata
                The authors confirm that all data underlying the findings are fully available without restriction. All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.

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