American Eel

The East River is located in Chester, Nova Scotia and is home to the American eel. Adult eels leave our freshwater rivers to travel to the Sargasso Sea where they spawn. Young American eels, called elvers, then travel up the eastern seaboard back into east coast rivers to mature and continue the cycle.

An Elver Abundance Study is currently being conducted by BCAF in the East River, Chester as a continuation of research that was originally carried out by Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) in the late 1990's. The present BCAF study will run for 3 years.

Historically, the American eel had the largest range of any fish species in the western hemisphere, and had a dominant position by numbers and biomass in many habitats it occupied. As such, American eel is a very important component of Canadian biodiversity, possibly playing a key role in habitats where it exists. American eel abundance has declined in Canada since the mid-1980's. Although the reasons for the decline are not completely known, key threats have been identified. These threats include fishing, dams, contaminants, and environmental degradation.

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Eels, because of their high calorie value, were used widely as a traveling food. Although eel was extremely important as food, Aboriginal people traditionally had many non-food uses for the species as well. Eel skin is thick and durable and has the property of tightening so it was used for many purposes: binding sleds, moccasins, clothing, tying spears and harpoons on sticks and so on. Because of its durability it was used as a ball in games of lacrosse . It was used as a covering for bow grips as recently as the late 1920’s at Curve Lake. Eel skin was the original support hose, enabling a type of garter to relieve sprains and was worn next to the skin for relief from cramps and rheumatism, a technology that was copied in Britain by 1590 (Porter 1958). The tightening quality of drying eel skin made the eel valuable when splints for broken bones were needed.

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