The orange-striped lionfish, native to the Indo-West Pacific Ocean, preys voraciously on native fish and poses potential human health threats.

Mike Parsons, director of Florida Gulf Coast University’s Coastal Watershed Institute, was anticipating its arrival and coincidentally had a survey planned for next week. His team will be going about five miles offshore to look not just for lionfish, but for a naturally-occurring toxin as well.

“We’re just going to go out probably to one or two reef sites to collect some algae to look for the source of the toxins – it’s a microalgae called Gambier discus and if we see lionfish we’ll collect lionfish and then potentially, depending on how many lionfish we can get, extract them for toxins and see if they have the toxins present,” said Parsons.

Prior to this week, the closest confirmed lionfish was 30 miles offshore Sanibel Island in 2011. With the potential to carry the ciguatera toxin, the lionfish is not recommended for eating.

“If they are eating other fish that’s a primary vector for ciguatera fish poisoning and so as some groups are suggesting we eat lionfish to try and control their populations that could be a human health concern if they are accumulating these toxins,” added Parsons.

Next week’s survey is the first step toward applying for grants to study the impacts of the lionfish in nearby coastal waters, which have remained one of the only areas in the eastern Gulf of Mexico to be lionfish-free.

“We’re pursuing some opportunities right now to try to obtain some funding for student support and supplies and then working in conjunction with Lee County going out and diving several sites so we can get a better handle on what the lionfish are doing out here,” said Parsons.

The long-term study has been in the planning for a while since the lionfish has made unprecedented inroads into the waters surrounding Florida and blanketed the Caribbean within three years. 

Known as a colorful and fanciful aquarium fish, the spread is attributed to people dumping their former pets into open water. Without an indigenous predator, the lionfish multiplies quickly and has a terrific appetite for juvenile native fish.

Scientists expect that it may infiltrate local estuaries this year. To control rapidly invading populations, they recommend killing the lionfish off by spearfishing.

A study in the Virgin Islands found about 50 percent of the lionfish there do carry the ciguatera toxin, thus putting a stop to plans to control its population by harvesting the fish for consumption.

 “The study in St. Thomas they did see toxins but it wasn’t like 90 percent of the fish were toxic -- the field is still young,” said Parsons. “I’d also like to add that this is a natural phenomenon. It’s a toxin that’s produced by microalgae, it just moves up through the food web, it has nothing to do with any pollutants or things like that.”

Parsons hopes to know more about the lionfish off Southwest Florida’s coast next week.