Giant grouper caught locally
The Wildlife Research Institute branch of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission estimates that a 350-pound Warsaw grouper caught off Southwest Florida near the end of December is 50 years old.
It’s a good bet the fish was older than the fisherman who reeled it in.
Richard Nixon was in the White House, the Beatles broke up and Apollo 13 survived a neartragic mission in 1970 — the year scientists think a Warsaw grouper caught in the waters off Southwest Florida likely hatched.
The unidentified angler caught the 350-pound grouper on Dec. 29 in about 600 feet of water using just a hook and line, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Wildlife Research Institute.
A Facebook posting Friday said biologists at the institute’s Age and Growth lab estimated the grouper’s age at 50 — making it the oldest sample it has ever collected.
The institute notes that the Warsaw grouper is the only grouper with 10 dorsal spines as all other types of grouper have 11.
Though the researchers seem somewhat awed by the catch, the posting notes that state wildlife officials don’t encourage the targeting of Warsaw groupers for catching since the status of the population in Gulf waters is unknown.
Adults of the species typically live at water depths of 180 to 1,700 feet though younger fish are sometimes seen around jetties and shallow-water reefs in the northern gulf, the posting says.
So far, no information is available about the circumstances of the catch or the fisherman who landed what the institute called, “A big old fish.”