Despite the fact that most eels are predators, many people consider them like the right choice for a home aquarium. However, eels are also a perfect catch for anglers, consisting of 4 suborders of the Anguilliformes with 19 families, 110 genres and near 400 different species.

Anguillidae is the suborder of freshwater eels, but there are also Heterenchelyidae, Chlopsidae (false morays), Myrocongridae, Moringuidae (worm eels), and Muraenidae (moray eels). Other classification based on the FishBase System, dividing eels into 15 families. In fact, there are several classification databases including the ITIS, and Systema Naturae 2000, each one giving different categories and suborders.

Juvenile American eels (Anguilla rostrata) are one of the varieties of freshwater acclimated eels in the United States. Originally found in Lesueur, Minnesota back in 1817. This snake-like fish used to appear more frequently in the state than they do today, when they are more commonly seen along the lower Mississippi River

Following the Mississippi's tributaries, including the Minnesota, Saint Lawrence Seaway, and Saint Croix rivers, anglers can find them profusely in the area, and sometimes in Lake Superior. Freshwater Females Eels swim all the way up the Mississippi River from the Gulf of Mexico to reach Minnesota for reproduction.

When eels are not migrating, it is easy to find them in medium to large size lakes and streams with quiet waters and muddy bottoms. Eels are more active at night, so they need the mud or underwater objects to be hidden during the day. Freshwater American eels live longer, and there is reference of captive eels living as long as 88 years.

Female eels of the Juvenile American specie grow larger than the males, nearly 3 feet (90 cm), although some records include eels as big as 5 feet (150 cm). Male eels do not grow longer than 1.5 feet (50 cm). In the wild, the is no evidence of how long freshwater eels live, but females spend from 10 to 20 years in the American rivers to mature and then they return to the oceans or die after breeding once.

Freshwater American eels are predators that feed at night, usually all types of meat they can find including insects, frogs, crayfish, snails, fish, and earthworms, although other predators seek eels as their meal such as cormorants, walleye, herons and mergansers, and sometimes land animals such otters and minks.

In the eastern United States, the American eels are harvested commercially, with a modest market of consumers. There is no a special concern status in Minnesota to preserve them. American eels probably have to fear to natural enemies: anglers in freshwater and sharks when they return to the ocean.

There is a website that has great information on most species of freshwater fish. It has details that pertain to each species of fish such as habitat, spawning, eating habits, the best lures and baits and more, the website is called: Fishing Stringer, and can be found at this url:

http://www.fishingstringer.com

By Robert W. Benjamin Copyright © 2007

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