How could such a pretty fish be such an ecological problem? The red lionfish, Pterois volitans,...
How could such a pretty fish be such an ecological problem? The red lionfish, Pterois volitans, has beautiful red stripes, streaming fins, and a fearless disposition, and it is deadly. Native to the Pacific Ocean, the red lionfish was first discovered on coral reefs in the Bahamas in 1985. The species has spread to over 3 million square kilometers of the western Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. Lionfish have a voracious appetite for native fish, are armed with venomous spines, and have no natural predators in their new range. Biologists are scrambling to study the reproductive biology of lionfish to inform management decisions. For example, Alexander Fogg and colleagues studied lionfish females in the northern Gulf of Mexico and estimated that an average female could produce 2,332,490 eggs per year. What time of year is reproductive rate the highest? To answer this question, the researchers collected an average of 200 lionfish each month and measured ovary size relative to body size, an indicator of reproductive capacity. 4.5 30 • Mass • Temperature 4.0 -28 3.5- 26 3.0 Mass of ovaries (percent of body mass) -24 Water temperature (C) 2.5 I 22 2.0 1.5 -20 . 2 1.0- 18 j M А S 0 N D AM J j Month Source: A. Q. Fogg. N. J. Brown-Peterson, and M. S. Peterson. 2017. Bulletin of Marine Science 93: 123 Part A Complete the take-home message of the graph. Match the terms in the left column to the appropriate blanks in the sentences on the right. Not all terms will be used. Reset Help February The mass of lionfish ovaries is lowest from to and highest from June July March August January