Jordan Zimmerman Delaware Division of Fish & Wildlife Overview Demand for glass eels Life History Stock status DE commercial fishery DDFW YOY survey at Millsboro Pond outlet Why the fuss? The answer is quite simple -$$$$ 3 species – A. japonica, A. anguilla, A. rostrata China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan have all developed sophisticated aquaculture operations that import glass eels Between 2011 and 2013, EU reduced exports of elvers demand in Asia soared Demand carried over to US price for glass eels from Maine went as high as $2,600/LB! Life History Eel life history often described with three $5 words Catadromous Spawn in ocean, live most of life in estuarine or fresh water Panmictic Single breeding population with random breeding Problems in one area can impact population Resilient to negative impacts in one area Semelparous Spawn once then die Every eel harvested before they spawn Life History cont’d Range= Mississippi drainage east to Atlantic; Carribean - Canada Maturity schedules dependent upon latitude and river mile Some DE eels may mature as early as 4 yo Fecundity 0.5 – 4 million eggs 8.5 million or more for very large individuals Stages of Development Silver Egress Yellow Resident Elver Pigmented YOY Glass Ingress Leptochephalus larval Life Cycle An Alternate Life Cycle Stock Status ASMFC 2012 Benchmark stock assessment “Data poor” analysis Defined status as “depleted” USFWS Petitioned to list American eel as endangered/threatened in 2004 Rejected after review (2007) Petitioned again recently and currently reviewing to ascertain if ESA listing is warranted Causes of “depleted” status Loss/alteration of habitat Turbine mortality Toxins and contaminants Parasites and disease A. crassus Up to 40% infection in DE in some years Historic overfishing The Delaware Eel Fishery Primarily yellow stage eels Food and bait (live market) 9” min 2 – 8 yo caught in baited traps HSC preferred bait Very old fishery: William Penn in 1683 listed “Ele” among the plentiful fish in his colony that were able to support a fishery DE Commercial Landings Most important fishery that no one knows about Landings ~100k pounds/year since 2000 3rd largest harvest of all Atlantic Coast states Occurs primarily in DE Bay tidal creeks; IB harvest averages 20% of state landings annually with as much as 42% in one year (2008) Average value ($389,912/yr) since 2000 ranks 5th among all DE fisheries for the same time period Management Concern realized in mid-90s 1999 FMP Mandatory commercial reporting YOY survey Subsequent addenda Trip level catch & effort reporting Min. size & mesh Rec bag limit reduction Glass Eel Mid-90s – boom in glass eel market Asian aquaculture; ease of transfer Low abundance of Japanese eel; European eel Effort/demand goes to US ME and SC only states with legal harvest “Gold rush” mentality Poaching and unreported landings DDFW survey • Feb 1st start or water temp above 3 ⁰C • Fyke net fished M-F; hauled out on weekends • All eels are counted (volumetrically) • Subsample = 60 (twice/wk) • L, W, and P stage are measured Sampling Site Glass eel site 2014 Results 26 samples Feb 4 – April 4 292,766 glass eels counted 2 peaks of ingress No correlation to temp or flow in 2014 Pigmentation Pigmentation generally increased throughout monitoring period indicating that most recruitment to IR occurred early in sampling Relative to other MA States Summary American eel population is facing challenges in many parts of its range Recruitment (glass eel) has been above average for past 3 years with the 2 highest annual catches encountered in the 15 year time series. Results indicate that DE has one of the most important juvenile nurseries for American eels along the Atlantic coast of the US .