This page is intended to provide information about the key fish that are either caught in the fishery, or have important ecological roles on the reef. It is summarized information (mostly from www.fishbase.org), so that people can learn why these fish might need to be protected or managed in some way. It is intended in part as a tool for the people of Ulithi to learn about their fish.
Reef Fishes Common to Eat
These fishes are broken up into groups: herbivorous fishes (Surgeonfish and parrotfish and other wrasses), and carnivorous fish (snapper and grouper and some wrasses). For each fish there is some life history information. There is also some information about their ‘resilience’ and ‘vulnerability’ in a fishery (this information is courtesy of Fishbase.org — thank you!).
If a fish has low resilience or sometimes medium resilience, that means it reproduces fairly slowly, and so can be vulnerable to overfishing. For others, like some of the surgeonfish, even though resilience is high, its important to watch the population because high numbers are needed to graze algae effectively off the reefs. If it has high resilience, it reproduces more quickly, and may be less vulnerable to overfishing.