[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he St. Lucie County Artificial Reef Program has been instrumental in protecting fishing, fisheries resources, and showing that artificial reefs are much more than places to catch fish. As early as 1989, the Fort Pierce Sportfishing Club led the efforts to have Special Management Zone (SMZ) designations given to two of the three current artificial reef sites. SMZ designations were proposed to prevent sites from becoming overharvested by overly efficient fishing gear. Highly effective commercial gear (fish traps and bottom longlines) and the harvest of goliath grouper (then known as jewfish) were prohibited on both sites. Bottom fishing using hydraulic or electric reels was also prohibited unless the reel was mounted on a hand-held rod. In addition, no spearfishing was allowed on the Stan Blum site while spearfishing of all types was allowed on the Fort Pierce Sportfishing Club site. In 1999, powerheads became prohibited on the Fort Pierce Sportfishing Club site. In 2002, these designations were given to other artificial reefs on the east coast of Florida.
Artificial reefs provide habitat for many of the physiological functions of aquatic organisms. Although annual monitoring has already shown many fish and invertebrate species inhabiting our artificial reefs, this monitoring also shows a wide range of species that are not harvested (caught for sport, such as sailfish, tropical fish, such as butterflyfish, or baitfish, such as blue runners). In addition, artificial reefs provide foraging areas for many adults and juveniles within the snapper-grouper complex (i.e. snowy grouper, red snapper), various species of cartilaginous fishes (sharks, skates, and rays), invertebrates (i.e. Oculina varicosa coral) and even loggerhead turtles during nesting season. The large species numbers on these reefs adds to the ecological stability of the reefs.
The County is partnering with SeaRover Services and the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute to document the presence of schools of fishes on its deepwater artificial reefs and to discern the function of these schools. In ten years of monitoring, SeaRover Services has detected large, spawning-sized scamp and gag groupers on St. Lucie County’s deepwater artificial reef site (a.k.a. Fort Pierce Sportfishing Club site). The proposed partnership will be used to determine if individual fishes use artificial reefs as sites to aggregate during spawning season and whether these fish are physiologically ready to spawn.
Deepwater reefs that are on the edge of the continental shelf are known as “shelf-edge reefs”. Shelf-edge reefs in many parts of the world are known as spawning locations for fish. A local example of a shelf-edge reef is the Oculina Banks coral reef system, first discovered in the 1970s by Harbour Branch. Many Oculina coral reefs are known to be severely impacted from human activities and do not provide the fish habitat they once provided.
Fish spawning on shelf-edge artificial reefs, if detected, would be important to:
* Perpetuate fish stocks for anglers to harvest; and
* Provide impetus to create additional artificial reefs, especially large vessel reefs that many deepwater species prefer.
The St. Lucie County Artificial Reef Program proposes to apply for an artificial reef monitoring grant through the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC). The FWC has provided the County with artificial reef construction funding for the last ten years. This funding originated as taxes on sportfishing gear and was passed down from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Sport Fish Restoration Program. St. Lucie County has paid for permit-required monitoring. The proposed monitoring, using divers, anglers, and remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) is not required but would be necessary to determine additional functions of artificial reefs, especially at night.
For more information on the St. Lucie County Artificial Reef Program, please contact Jim Oppenborn, St. Lucie County Coastal Resources Supervisor at oppenbornj@stlucieco.org or (772)462-1713.
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