The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is excited to announce the 2022 Lionfish Challenge tournament, which kicks off May 20 and ends Sept. 6.
The Lionfish Challenge is a summer-long lionfish tournament open to competitors around the state of Florida. It’s the seventh year of the Lionfish Challenge, and our goal is still the same: remove as many lionfish as we can in just 3.5 months. Are you up for the Challenge?
Tournament details:
Timeline: May 20 to Sept. 6. Categories: Participants will compete in either the commercial or the recreational division.
Prizes will be awarded in tiers as follows:
- Tier 1 - Harvest 25 lionfish (recreational category) or 25 pounds of lionfish (commercial category).
- Tier 2 – Harvest 100 lionfish (recreational category) or 250 pounds of lionfish (commercial category).
- Tier 3 – Harvest 300 lionfish (recreational category) or 500 pounds of lionfish (commercial category).
- Tier 4- Harvest 600 lionfish (recreational category) or 1000 pounds of lionfish (commercial category)
FloGrown is the presenting sponsor for this year’s Lionfish Challenge. FloGrown is a Florida-based fishing and outdoor apparel company that supports the organizations and divers that work to fight the lionfish invasion.
This year’s tournament shirt was custom-designed and printed by FloGrown and will be awarded to participants who reach the first prize tier.
Additional prizes are provided by FloGrown, Neritic, ZooKeeper, Divers Alert Network, Shearwater, Smith Optics, GoPro, YETI, and more!
To read the full tournament rules or register, visit FWCReefRangers.com/lionfish-challenge.