BIOLOGICAL POLLUTION - Marine Pollution: What Everyone Needs to Know - page 191

discovered, along with worms and sea urchins. In 2012 a 66
ft-long commercial shipping dock washed ashore in Oregon.
Of the 100 species attached to its sides, two-thirds were native
to Asia, including seaweeds, mussels, sea stars, barnacles,
crabs, and oysters, which survived at sea for 14 months and
about 5,000 miles. Fish native to East Asia were discovered on
a Japanese fishing boat set adrift by the tsunami that washed
ashore in Washington state two years later. Sea anemones,
scallops, crabs, worms, and sea cucumbers were also found
on the boat. The West Coast states and Hawaii have developed
response plans. A Japan Tsunami Marine Debris Taxonomic
Assessment Team, with experts familiar with marine
organisms of the North Pacific will examine photographs
quickly to indicate if a species is potentially invasive so that
decision-makers can determine a response strategy.
What are some invasive marine fishes and what harm
do they do?
Lionfish ( Pterois volitans ), native to the Indo-Pacific and avail-
able in the tropical fish trade, were spotted first in the early
1990s off the coast of Florida and were believed to have either
been released from aquaria or when Hurricane Andrew
flooded aquarium and pet stores near the coast (Figure 10.1). In
the Atlantic they are taking food and habitat from native fishes
that are important to the local ecology and economy. They have
no natural predators, and are now found in large numbers in
nearly all marine habitats in the Atlantic along the Southeast
United States and continuing along the South American coast,
as well as in the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean, to which they
have spread. They have a potent venom in their spines that
deters predators. Their sting normally is not deadly, but it is
extremely painful. As shown by Mark Albins and other inves-
tigators, their densities have surpassed some native reef fish in
many areas, and they grow larger and are far more abundant
in the invaded areas than they are in their Pacific native range;