Atlantic Goliath Grouper of Florida: To Fish or Not to Fish
2020
Koenig, Christopher C. | Coleman, Felicia C. | Malinowski, Christopher R.
The Atlantic Goliath Grouper Epinephelus itajara, a large indigenous tropical reef fish, approached local extinction in U. S. waters by the 1980s as a result of intense fishing pressure. In 1990, federal and state laws intervened to protect this species. The resulting fishery closure, over the intervening years, allowed limited, slow population recovery in Florida waters while populations outside of the United States remained vulnerable (IUCN 2019). The closure led to the blossoming of a dive ecotourism industry catering to local and international divers seeking opportunities to see and photograph these enormous fish. This fundamentally changes the paradigm for Goliath Grouper from a fishery resource to a non‐extractive resource with a commercial value vastly greater than that gained through fishing. While federal and state agencies attempted to re‐establish the fishery, all three stock assessments were rejected. Here, we discuss Goliath Grouper's biology, the controversy surrounding its protection, and the drawbacks of re‐establishing a fishery including: loss of nursery habitat, increasingly destructive episodic events like red tide and cold snaps, and the effects of mercury contamination on survival. Add to this the human health risk of consuming mercury‐contaminated fishes, and the argument supporting re‐opening the fishery evaporates.
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