Northern Gulf of Mexico Ecopath with Ecosim model input: lionfish impact on native reef fish commmunities

This dataset contains input data for an Ecopath model of the northern Gulf of Mexico (NGoM) designed to understand the effects of invasive lionfish on native reef fish communities. The model domain extends from 29°-30.5°N and 85.5°-88.5°W covering an area of approximately 48,000 km^2^ over the continental shelf ecosystem. The Ecopath model base year is 2010, which represent the starting values for Ecosim simulations run through 2017. Biomass density inputs are in units of mt/km^2^ and were derived from an ROV survey conducted on natural and artificial reefs in the NGoM (GRIIDC DOIs: 10.7266/N7J38QKR; 10.7266/N7XS5SZP; 10.7266/N7T1526M; 10.7266/N72J68SF; 10.7266/N7DV1GTP). Fish biomass densities on non-reef habitats were obtained from the SEAMAP trawl survey (https://seamap.gsmfc.org/index.php). Invertebrate biomasses were estimated in Ecopoath after providing the ecotrophic efficiencies from an existing Ecopath model of the West Florida Shelf (Chagaris et al. 2015; https://doi.org/10.1080/19425120.2014.966216). Production and consumption rates of fish were obtained from fishbase (www.fishbase.org) and for invertebrates were borrowed from the West Florida Shelf (WFS) model of Chagaris et al. (2015). Diet compositions were assimilated from data collected by the Florida FWC fish feeding ecology laboratory, the Gulf of Mexico Species Interactions Database (https://github.com/GoMexSI/gomexsi-web), trophic studies in the NGoM (Dahl and Patterson 2014; Dahl et al. 2017; GRIIDC DOI: 10.7266/N7XS5SBM), and Fishbase. Recreational landings and discards were obtained from the NOAA Fisheries Office of Science and Technology Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP, https://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/recreational-fisheries/MRIP/) and commercial fishery statistics datasets (https://www.st.nmfs.noaa.gov/commercial-fisheries/commercial-landings/index).