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Parasite-mediated enemy release and low biotic resistance may facilitate invasion of Atlantic coral reefs by Pacific red lionfish (Pterois volitans)

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Abstract

Successful invasions are largely explained by some combination of enemy release, where the invader escapes its natural enemies from its native range, and low biotic resistance, where native species in the introduced range fail to control the invader. We examined the extent to which parasites may mediate both release and resistance in the introduction of Pacific red lionfish (Pterois volitans) to Atlantic coral reefs. We found that fewer lionfish were parasitized at two regions in their introduced Atlantic range (The Bahamas and the Cayman Islands) than at two regions in their native Pacific range (the Northern Marianas Islands and the Philippines). This pattern was largely driven by relatively high infection rates of lionfish by didymozoan fluke worms and parasitic copepods (which may be host-specific to Pterois lionfishes) in the Marianas and the Philippines, respectively. When compared with sympatric, native fishes in the Atlantic, invasive lionfish were at least 18 times less likely to host a parasite in The Bahamas and at least 40 times less likely to host a parasite in the Cayman Islands. We found no indication that lionfish introduced Pacific parasites into the Atlantic. In conjunction with demographic signs of enemy release such as increased density, fish size, and growth of invasive lionfish, it is possible that escape from parasites may have contributed to the success of lionfish. This is especially true if future studies reveal that such a loss of parasites has led to more energy available for lionfish growth, reproduction, and/or immunity.

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Acknowledgements

For work in The Bahamas, we thank the staff of the Perry Institute of Marine Science for logistic support, and Mark Albins, Tye Kindinger, Emily Pickering, Gabe Scheer, and Kristal Ambrose for assisting with data collection. For work in the Cayman Islands, we thank the staff of the Central Caribbean Marine Institute for their logistic support, and Tye Kindinger and Casey Benkwitt for their extensive help in the field. For work in the Philippines, we thank Hilconida Calumpong and the staff of the Silliman University Marine Laboratory for supporting our visit, as well as Dioscoro Inocencio, Tina Santos, and Malatapay Bantay Dagat for assistance with fieldwork and obtaining fish, and Rene Abesamis, Renclar Jadloc, and Jennifer McIlwain for assistance with permit processing. For hosting and assisting us in Guam, we thank the lab of Jennifer McIllwain at the University of Guam, as well as Jason Miller. Omar Amin, Al Dove, Julianne Passarelli, and Zullaylee Ramos-Ascherl helped identify many parasites. Casey Benkwitt, Alex Davis, Stephanie Green, Kurt Ingeman, and Tye Kindinger helped to improve early versions of this manuscript.

Funding

This study was funded by research grants to MA Hixon by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF OCE 08-51162 and 12-33027). LJ Tuttle received the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, and scholarships from the American Academy of Underwater Sciences, the American Museum of Natural History, and Oregon State University.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI, 96822, USA

    Lillian J. Tuttle & Mark A. Hixon

  2. Department of Integrative Biology, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, 97331, USA

    Lillian J. Tuttle & Mark A. Hixon

  3. Department of Biological Sciences, Arkansas State University, Jonesboro, AR, 72467, USA

    Paul C. Sikkel

  4. Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa

    Paul C. Sikkel

  5. Australian Institute of Marine Science, Indian Ocean Marine Research Centre, Crawley, 6009, Australia

    Katherine Cure

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  1. Lillian J. Tuttle
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Correspondence to Lillian J. Tuttle.

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Tuttle, L.J., Sikkel, P.C., Cure, K. et al. Parasite-mediated enemy release and low biotic resistance may facilitate invasion of Atlantic coral reefs by Pacific red lionfish (Pterois volitans). Biol Invasions 19, 563–575 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-016-1342-8

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