# Eels!



## Dan19 (Mar 10, 2008)

Hey everyone,
was watching this creature thing show today for a bit, and on it this young guy owned two eels.
What i wanted to know if there are any eel owners out there on this website? and if you have any pictures aswell?
thanks


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## bump73 (Mar 10, 2008)

Have none at the moment but have kept Australian eels, spiney eels and a fire eel...

Have no pics on computer will have to scan some in when i get a chance..

The Aus eels are notorious for escaping and eating anything else in the tank, The spiney eels are really particular as to what they eat (live blood worms) and the fire eels are bloody expensive $300-400 at least..

Ben


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## Dan19 (Mar 10, 2008)

With everything togother including tank, filter, eel ect... they look like they are a pretty expensive setup?


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## itbites (Mar 10, 2008)

*Fresh water eels are cheap as but hard to keep in the tank LOL escape through filters and bash against the lid crazy critters and i think they have teeth too*


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## mrmikk (Mar 10, 2008)

I opened this thread thinking you were talking about the Parra Eels, oh well. :lol:


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## arbok (Mar 10, 2008)

i remember the good old days when me and my mates use to catch eels at centennial park lol '
with all the asian tourists screaming and giving us the weirdest looks as we pulled eels out of a pond... lol


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## itbites (Mar 10, 2008)

*Hehe my mum caught one along time ago and her bait...a cigarette butt *


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## Dan19 (Mar 10, 2008)

lol, a cigarette butts pretty cheap for bait.


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## Lozza (Mar 10, 2008)

my fav are snowflake eels - don't own any unfortunately but used to know someone who had one


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## luke_84 (Mar 10, 2008)

ive got some eels in my fish tank, not sure what kind they are, about 6 inches long striped and never see them unless its feed time, wont be long and they will be frontosa food


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## Dan19 (Mar 10, 2008)

do you mean your gunna kill you eels?


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## luke_84 (Mar 10, 2008)

Dan19 said:


> do you mean your gunna kill you eels?


 
no i wont kill them, they are living with quite a few frontosa, and they are nearly big enough to eat the eels, no loss really, only cheap eels


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## Dan123 (Mar 10, 2008)

hey dan lol
i own a green moray eel.
ive had him for about a year now after my snowflake moray died for no apparent reason.
honestaly i wouldent recomend a green moray for a pet. ive worked in an aquarium, own 2 other marine setups and have read every text on morays i could find and have still had about 10problems with him. not to mention when i got him he bit me and bassically shredded most of the skin on my thumb, well now hes 3 times the size he was then.

the snowflake was a great one to own so if i had to id recomend one of them. but at the same time you must remember that a small marine setup will cost about a thousand bucks and they are a lot less hardy than most reptiles. the water must be perfect and the setup must be perfect aswell.


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## Dan19 (Mar 10, 2008)

Oh yeah, i remember that you had one aswell. I cant be bothered with one right now anyways as they seemed like they had too much effort in them. whered u get yours anyways


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## Sdaji (Mar 11, 2008)

I've seen Short-finned Eels (the common ones in the rivers and lakes of south eastern Australia) 'swim' up to about 10m through mud which was firm enough for me to walk on. I'd try to catch them from puddles in drying lakes and billabongs, they'd bury into the mud and pop their heads out some time later, quite a distance from the puddle, sometimes pushing up from underneath large chunks of solidified mud. When the puddles dry out even more you'd just see their heads poking out into the air from the almost dried mud. Those things slither their way across incredible distances of dry land, it's amazing to think that they breed out in the ocean but still manage to exist in large numbers in some bodies of water you'd think are completely inaccessable to them. No wonder they're brilliant escape artists! I tried keeping them about 15 years ago. I actually did manage to contain them in the aquaria, but for some reason I had a lot of trouble keeping them alive. It used to astonish me that a creature which could live in filthy, stinking, firm mud in the hot sun would drop dead in a fish tank.


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## Dan19 (Mar 11, 2008)

thanks Sdaji, i never would have thought that they could swim through pretty much dry mud. thats good as lol
any pics of setups here?


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## cuddlykylie (Mar 11, 2008)

we have a marine eel, a snowflake one and a zebra moray eel, and i also have a tropical spiney eel


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## Helikaon (Mar 11, 2008)

maybe they need filthy dirty hot sun conditions Sdaji  you were to good to them


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## WombleHerp (Mar 11, 2008)

i want an eel 
eels are great fun to watch eat stuff and nip at the swamp hens and eat the chicks hahaha i want one


Nat


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## Magpie (Mar 11, 2008)

I thought long-finned eels were the common ones.
It is amazing some of the places they are found, we swim with them regularly at a place that has at leat 50 rapids to navigate before they get there.


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## Sdaji (Mar 12, 2008)

The ones I'm talking about are the Short-finned Eels, _Anguilla australis_ (yes, I had to look up the scientific name!). By far, most of the freshwater eels I've seen around Victoria have been this species, although you're right, the Long-finned Eel also occurs in the area. The Long-finned Eels are more of a river thing, so probably wouldn't be as well adapted to surviving the nasty dry conditions, although I've had little to do with them.

picture and data here:
http://www.nativefish.asn.au/sfeel.html

That these things manage (as tiny babies!) to cross so much land to get into isolated bodies of water, then grow into great big eels and slither back into rivers and out into the ocean still astounds me.

The Long-finned Eel, _Anguilla reinhardtii_ is fairly similar and their ranges overlap. Both do the same 'swim out to the ocean, breed, die and let the babies swim back to fresh water' reproduction.

Picture and data here:
http://www.mdbc.gov.au/subs/fish-info/native_info/longfinnedEel.html



Magpie said:


> I thought long-finned eels were the common ones.
> It is amazing some of the places they are found, we swim with them regularly at a place that has at leat 50 rapids to navigate before they get there.


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## Dan19 (Mar 12, 2008)

some pretty cool stuff i didnt know about eels here...


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## cockney red (Mar 12, 2008)

*Stewed,or Jellied, they are one of the best fish you can eat. Pie, mash, stewed Eels and Liquor, my favorite nosebag.:lol::lol::lol::lol:*


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## cris (Mar 12, 2008)

I have kept short fined eels before, i got rid of them though because im not sure if there is any legal way of obtaining small ones(30cm size limit). The short fin has a shorter fin on top than the one underneath, long fin eels fins are equal length.

Sdaji, I dont know why they would be dying as they are extremely hardy. Maybe they where fighting or something, I noticed they were quite bitey at times depending on how they are kept. Maybe stress from trying to escape :?

They are great critters to keep, far more interesting than any python IMO. They also become tame fairly quick. Its best to keept them in something they can burrow in too.


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## bredli84 (Mar 12, 2008)

i have been interested in eels ever since i saw them swarming in the lake at the melb botanical gardens.
would be interesting to keep, but i have never maintained an aquarium before and no longer have the time to bother now.

i have seen snow flake eels in pet shops and recently saw a ribbon eel. was a beautiful looking animal.


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## ssssmithy (Mar 12, 2008)

iv got one big fella, bout 1.5mtres long, as thick as my arm lol caught him on a shark rig fishing the brissy river. just an old fresh water eel. cool pet though hand feed him and all. bit of a pain to get him out when it comes to cleaning. got him and some other big fish in a water tank cut in half about 1500ltres. run a bio filter on that along with some power head filters.


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## Dan123 (Mar 12, 2008)

dont even bother with a ribbon eel.
the best aquariests cant keep them alive for more than 6months.
people get sucked in becuase they are such damn good looking eels.


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## fuegan13 (Mar 12, 2008)

i had a freshwater spiney eel that unfortutunatly managent to sqeeze himself in my powerhead and got a bit dead ( they get in the most amazing spots....so make sure ur tank is like super safe before you get one )

i prefer ghosts knifes myself... kind of eel looking mine had a heaps better personality.... (would handfeed, and come up "begging" for food... although i dont even know how it knew i was in the room coz thier eyes are dodgy)


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## s_vivo (Mar 13, 2008)

Any photos ??


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## coxy (Mar 13, 2008)

fuegan13 said:


> i had a freshwater spiney eel that unfortutunatly managent to sqeeze himself in my powerhead and got a bit dead ( they get in the most amazing spots....so make sure ur tank is like super safe before you get one )
> 
> i prefer ghosts knifes myself... kind of eel looking mine had a heaps better personality.... (would handfeed, and come up "begging" for food... although i dont even know how it knew i was in the room coz thier eyes are dodgy)


GO THE EELS!!!!!!
had to say it.

Yeah my ghost knife is my fav fish in my tank love watching them swim , and the second i open the hood for any reason he comes up looking for food.
My favourite thing he does when he comes up for food, the cat fish sneak into his little spot to eat the algae and then he will go back down and chase them all out. 
You could always get some kuhli loach, there like miniature eels


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## Sdaji (Mar 13, 2008)

I don't know why they died on me either. I kept and bred countless fish for over 10 years, including a lot of the stuff which is very tricky to keep alive. I'd have thought it would be more difficult to kill an eel than to keep it alive, but something strange was obviously going on.

The good side to it was that when I caught them from then on, I could enjoy them barbecued :lol: They're certainly one of my favourite fish to eat


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## Dinoizmadragon (May 18, 2008)

I have a backyard pond, could i keep a fresh water eel in there? and could he live with turtles and fish?


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## reconeyez (May 18, 2008)

yeah i got a nice chain link moray


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## thals (May 18, 2008)

Ribbon eels are truly spectacular looking creatures, with their vivid blue and yellow colouration but due to their limited success rate in captivity, they're best left in their natural habitat. Gorgeous animals nonetheless


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## ssssmithy (May 18, 2008)

heres a pic of mine taken a while ago...


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## aqua (May 18, 2008)

I had a common freshwater one for all of a day. It pushed the glass lid off the tank and crawled through the house trying to escape the first night. I decided with that sort of motivation it was better off free so let it go where I caught it. Never again.


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