All five winners of the inaugural Winter Lionfish Derby have been announced and about 100 lionfish were caught in total.

As revealed in The Royal Gazette this month, Mark Outerbridge won the free diving category, bagging 53 lionfish during the three-week contest.

Jon Pedro and Mike Sinclair picked up second and third prize in the category, bagging eight fish and seven fish respectively.

Tommy Sinclair won the prize for the largest fish after picking up a 19-inch lionfish — believed to be the largest of the species ever caught in the Island’s waters — and Adrienne Smatt picked up the prize for smallest at four inches.

The Winter Lionfish Derby was launched by researcher Corey Eddy in January due to an increase of lionfish being reported in shallow waters.

His research at the University of Massachusetts focuses on the problem of invasive lionfish and aims to look into some of the possible solutions.

Mr Eddy needed more information about lionfish habits in Bermuda during the winter months because fewer people were in the water monitoring them, and believed launching a competition was the perfect solution.

He was able to gather some sponsorship to be able to give cash prizes to the winners, ranging from $200 to $50.

The Winter Lionfish Derby joins the annual Groundswell Lionfish Tournament, which was launched by the marine conservation charity Groundswell.