They migrate up streams and river and will even cross land during rainstorms. All of the eels you might see in freshwater in north america are the same American Eels that are born in the Saragasso sea.

Harvesting of elvers was (maybe still is) legal in NH and ME, IIRC they caught a large ring of poachers poaching elvers last spring in MA.

Thats pretty good joe.

In my view fishery managerment has lost credibility. This eel thing as all the elements of yet another fishery management botch job. They continue to make rulings on subjective scientific guestimates which has been their downfall. They claim that it is not their fault and it is the best science available (I think it is their fault)... The same will happen with the eel.
The same people (whomever they are)who brought us the other fishery disasters will muck up the eels too. Just watch.

Suggestion from the peanut gallery: If in fact the eel population is hardest hit by hydro-electric dams....FIX THE DAMS so that problem is a non-issue. Surely this is possible. If they could save the salmon with a fish latter they can do something for the eel. In fact I think it would be pretty easy. How come this is so long in comming?

Oh I forgot, give credit where credit is due: They saved the spiny dogfish, Lord knows we need more of them. :hs:

as for fixing the dams, they have made ladders for eels. its a long brillow pad with water trickeling down it. Its perfect for the elvers to go up, but the big hawg moma eels wont use them going down they do get sucked up in the turbines :(

If any water eventually makes it to the sea, eels will be there, even hundreds of miles inland.

For the record:
The correct spelling is catadromous. Fish that grow to adulthood in fresh water, breed in salt. Yes, they can make it to the Sargasso. Atlantic salmon go from CT and other places in New England to the Labrador Strait off Greenland to grow out, return here to spawn (those very few that now make it). Used to be 40,000 or so in CT River system alone, before the dams. Stripers go from Maine (maybe some from Nova Scotia) to the Chesapeake. Herring from Bay of Fundy to Carolinas and Florida. Why not?
American eels and European eels are thought to breed in the Sargasso. They float along the Gulf Stream as larvae. American eels develop faster, move inland to fresh water. Europeans develop more slowly, travel farther before moving inland in Europe.
Eels can be found in inland ponds, they can travel short distances over wet grass between bodies of water. They can also get around dams this way.
Aquacultured eels are only profitable if sale prices are high. You have to be able to pay for your aquaculture systems, electricity, labor, feed, antibiotics,... Probably not going to profit much at the $1 you can get for them in bait shops. The Japanese raise them for food, get $$$ per pound. I don't want to shuck out that much for bait, either do you.
Correct that eels won't breed in Fresh water.
grb