Longfin Eel

Interesting Info

• The Longfin Eel is found along the eastern seaboard of Australia, from Cape York in Queensland through New South Wales and Victoria to eastern Tasmania, and also occurs in New Guinea and parts of the Pacific.
• Its body is dark olive-brown to almost black above and pale silvery underneath, with a dorsal fin that extends much further forward than in the Shortfin Eel — giving it its name.
• Adults are nocturnal predators, eating fish, yabbies, frogs, snails, insects, and even waterbirds if the chance arises.
• By day, they rest in mud burrows, under logs, or in dense vegetation, emerging at night to hunt.
• They can travel overland across damp ground on rainy nights, using their slimy skin to breathe air while wriggling between waterways.
• Aboriginal peoples have harvested Longfin Eels for thousands of years, using stone weirs and traps, smoking them for preservation, and celebrating them as a staple food.
• Like all true eels, it is catadromous, living in rivers, lakes, and wetlands, then migrating to the Coral Sea to spawn once before dying.
• Breeding has never been seen directly, but adults travel thousands of kilometres to deep tropical waters to release their eggs.
• Eggs hatch into tiny, transparent leaf-shaped larvae (leptocephali) that drift with ocean currents for up to 12 months.
• These transform into glass eels, then pigmented elvers, which migrate upstream into rivers, sometimes travelling hundreds of kilometres inland.
• They are considered a delicacy in parts of Asia and Europe, and live exports from Australia supply these markets.
• Their lifespan is between 20–30 years, and some have reached 50 years or more before making their spawning journey.