Grouper is poisinous???

[Terry England]

Originally Posted by bigeasy1

......I think I ate three of them in four days at Doc Fords in Sanibel, nary a bit of indigestion.

Well John, I guess that was a pretty good recommendation you got -!

As usual Conner is "spot on". The deal is Ciguatera , they believe, comes up the food chain this way - Corals have poisons that attack fishes nervious systems - all fish except Clown Fish (Nemo) and Parrot Fish, that is. Clown Fish hide in the coral, Parrot fish actually EAT the coral. (When you are diving near them you can actually hear them "crunching" it up - weird) Barracuda, Big Snappers, Jacks and Grouper sometimes eat Parrot Fish. If the Grouper, Snapper, Barracuda or Jack is big it may have eaten a lot of Parrot Fish in it's lifetime and they get a buildup of these toxins in their meat. Parrot fish are prevelent in the Central and South America, the Caribbean and the Keys. There are virtually no Parrot Fish in the Gulf of Mexico on Florida's West Coast so there would be no coral toxins (Cigutera) in the food chain with Gulf Grouper. My 'ol Cuban buddies said when they were "back on the island", if someone caught a big Grouper or Snapper, they would cut a piece of meat off the fish and put it next to an ant bed. If the ant's ate it it would be OK, if they left it alone it had too much poison (ciguatera) in it and they threw it away. They say they never ate Barracuda there but they eat Gulf Barracuda here, especially the 3 footers. Gulf Wild Grouper is the best - 3 out of 4 nights at Doc. Ford's proves that, John.