Marine Ecosystems Can Rebound with Controlled Lionfish Kills [VIDEO]

In recent years, lionfish have overtaken regions of the Atlantic ocean and become a threat to native marine populations. Now new research around coral reefs shows that with a targeted reduction of lionfish numbers, the natural ecosystems in place can rebound.

Researchers with Oregon State University, Simon Fraser University and other organizations report that field tests and computer simulations show that a reduction of lionfish around reef ecosystems - albeit in large numbers of 75-95 percent - will allow for a quick recovery of native fish in the treated area. This, in turn, will have a spillover effect that may trigger larger ecosystem recovery as well, the researchers found.

The news is welcome by conservationists, who have been struggling to keep invasive lionfish populations at bay. Lionfish are voracious predators that will eat just about anything smaller than they are. In some cases, lionfish have been responsible for a 95 percent reduction in native fish populations. NOAA has called the lionfish a top predator in many of the coral reef environments of the Atlantic.

"This is excellent news," Stephanie Green, a marine ecologist in the College of Science at Oregon State University, said of the find. Green is the lead author of the lionfish study, published in the journal Ecological Applications.

"It shows that by creating safe havens, small pockets of reef where lionfish numbers are kept low, we can help native species recover," she said. "And we don't have to catch every lionfish to do it."

That the natural ecosystems can recover without 100 percent removal of lionfish is seen as good news, because lionfish spread so rapidly that their complete eradication would be nearly impossible.

At Caribbean sites where the lionfish population was controlled, native prey fish, such as Nassau grouper and yellowtail snapper, increased by 50-70 percent, the researchers report.

The reclamation of the reefs by native fish is good not just for the ecosystem, but for local economies as well. Nassau grouper and yellowtail snapper are "critically important to local economies," the researchers said.

The researchers report that their study is the first to demonstrate that it is not necessary to completely eradicate lionfish from an area in order for native marine populations to recover.