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Pufferfish, a warm-water invasive species first spotted in Greek waters some 20 years ago, have been wreaking havoc on the country's fishing industry, a pillar of the nation's agricultural exports.
Off the coast of Crete, Greece’s largest island, fishermen are seeing their catch dwindle because of the silver-cheeked Lagocephalus sceleratus menace, which typically measures between 40 and 60 cm.
"It’s an omnivorous fish that eats everything it encounters," said 65-year-old fisherman Giannis Giankakis. "Nothing seems to bother it, because it has no natural predators among other fish," he added.
Moored in the Greek port of Ierapetra in southwestern Crete, Alexis Charlambakis uses a tool to open the mouth of a freshly caught pufferfish on his boat, revealing two massive teeth on each jaw.
"If one of these bites you, it will take your finger clean off," the 43-year-old said. "They are the destruction of the sea. They leave nothing behind."
Proof of the damage is visible on a neighboring boat deck: a ray, a common seabream and another fish netted that day lie half-shredded.
The pufferfish explosion in Greek waters is the latest example of how warming oceans are changing ecosystems and upturning their reliant economies.
Of the nearly 200 species of pufferfish living in the world’s warm waters, three are currently found in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Scientists recorded them for the first time in Greece in June 2005, said Nota Peristeraki of the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR).
Present in the Red Sea and in the Indian and Pacific oceans, the silver-cheeked pufferfish entered the Mediterranean via the Suez Canal, according to Universite Cote d’Azur, which records non-native Mediterranean species.
Originally located near Crete and the Dodecanese islands, it has since spread to other areas, Peristeraki said.
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In addition to the powerful toxin that makes them deadly to eat, these members of the Tetraodontidae family have a beak-like mouth strong enough to bite through wood and metal.
They not only ravage the fishermen's daily catch, but leave their nets in tatters too. "If this wasn't my boat, I'd quit this profession for good," Charlambakis said. "The situation is dire ... we cannot survive," he told AFP.
After five days at sea, Charlambakis said his nets became useless and difficult to repair. "It took me two days to fix these nets. I took them out this morning, another 20 holes," he said.
Feasting on other fish, crustaceans and squid, pufferfish cause around €8,500’ ($9,800) worth of damage and lost income per year to fishing boats, said Peristeraki, the HCMR marine biologist.
The predator also contains tetrodotoxin, "an extremely dangerous toxin if ingested," warns HCMR marine biologist Thekla Anastasiou. "It causes heart failure and stops the lungs from functioning," Anastasiou said.
"It is imperative to reduce their population," Peristeraki said. That's easier said than done, fishermen say. "The job gets worse every year," said 53-year-old fisherman Kostis Zevelekakis.
"The state isn’t doing enough to help us deal with these fish ... We can control their numbers if we’re given the right framework to hunt them," he added. The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in April released a responsible seafood guide with over a hundred species found on the Greek market.
Among them are 13 invasive species that were not in the previous guide in 2015. The newcomers include the Atlantic shrimp and blue crab in the northern Aegean Sea, and the lionfish in waters further south.
The fishermen want the state to subsidize them to hunt pufferfish. "They should give us an incentive to round them up," said 25-year-old Babis Doriakis.
"I have taken on my father's fishing boat, but I won't be able to continue without assistance," he said. Former deputy agriculture minister Christos Kellas told parliament in February that authorities were examining a support program for fishermen.
Scientists, in the meantime, are trying to find ways to neutralize the fish's deadly toxin, which can cause paralysis, respiratory failure, and death. "At present, the pufferfish are considered class 1 waste," the equivalent of potentially threatening industrial waste, said Elkethe chemist Manolis Mandalakis.
Under EU rules, the appropriate way to treat this waste is incineration (destruction by burning at high temperatures), he said. "We are trying to find alternative ways ... that are less energy-consuming," said Mandalakis. Potential uses could include fertilizer or fish feed, he said.
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