The silence underwater was suffocating. Time passes quickly. When I found the target, I stared at it because I knew that if the shot was deflected and let it escape, it might learn from the encounter and be more difficult to catch later.
As I approached with a harpoon, I saw the fish open its broad pectoral fins, revealing stingers. (It moves slowly and is easy to spot, relying on such intimidation to scare off potential predators.) I aimed at it, pulled the spring trigger, and the harpoon flew out.
I learned freediving and underwater hunting since I was a child, but fishing with a harpoon is no longer exciting for me. As an adult, I became interested in marine biology and underwater photography, eventually trading my childhood harpoon for my first professional underwater camera. Shortly after that, I earned a master's degree in marine biology. As a marine conservation photographer for the past decade, I have been living on the small Caribbean island of Bonaire.
My number one goal is to document the efforts of the local community – including scientists, professional divers and volunteers – to protect the coral reefs on Bonaire. Here, a large part of the integrated conservation effort is focused on one particular species of fish: the lionfish (i.e. the spotted-finned scorpionfish and the soaring scorpionfish).
Lionfish are native to the Pacific and Indian Oceans. But over the past few decades, they have settled in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, an invasion that poses a serious threat to both the tropical Atlantic reefs and their habitats here.
The impact is staggering. A study conducted by scientists at Oregon State University found that in just five weeks, a single lionfish reduced the number of juveniles in its feeding zone by 80 percent. And they are very fertile: females lay about 25,000 eggs every few days. In some places, including the Bahamas, lionfish populations are likely to have contributed to the most dramatic changes in coral reef habitat biodiversity since industrialization.
Communities across the Caribbean are taking steps to curb the growth of lionfish populations. Bonaire relies on volunteers who catch lionfish, the Bonaire National Park Foundation (STINAPA), a non-profit foundation that manages Bonaire Nature Park, and help from local dive shops.
Diver catching is a way to precisely control lionfish populations, as underwater capture causes little collateral damage. However, divers can comfortably dive to a limited depth, usually around 18 meters. When lionfish move deeper, traps can be used to catch them.
Due to the ban on harpoon fishing in Bonaire, and to prevent injury, special tools have been developed and promoted to help divers catch fish. The ELF tool — meaning "eradicating lionfish" — also helps avoid the damage caused to coral reefs by traditional harpoon guns and nets.
While it is relatively easy to catch lionfish, it can be difficult and dangerous to remove the fish from the tip of an ELF tool while avoiding being injured by its stingers. As a result, lionfish hunters also began to use a device called a "zookeeper", which is actually a piece of PVC pipe, closed at one end and a modified plastic funnel at the other. As long as the lionfish is caught with an ELF fork, the fish (and harpoon tip) are stuffed into the "zookeeper" through the funnel; After the harpoon is pulled out, the fish is trapped in the tube.
When I first came to Bonaire, I was introduced to a conservation project aimed at eradicating lionfish. Because I had fishing experience, I was immediately invited to participate. While my real interest was documenting the efforts of this community, I did.
Since then, I have been amazed by the destructive power of this spiked animal.
It feels cruel to kill such a beautiful creature, even though I intellectually understand that it is ecologically beneficial. After all, the problem is not the lionfish; Scientists theorize that they came here because ornamental fish farmers dumped unwanted fish off the coast of Florida, and they were abandoned probably because the rest of the fish in the tank were eaten dry and wiped out by them.
However, killing these lionfish one by one may be the best way to slow down the damage they have done to Caribbean coral reefs.