Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 39, Number 58, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 March 1907 — Eels Spawn at Sea. [ARTICLE]

Eels Spawn at Sea.

The fact that biologists have been all at sea about the Whereabouts of the eel family’s breeding comes to Hght through the announcement that Danish marine scientists have just completed investigations showing that the eels of Europe spawn at a depth of 3,300 feet in the Atlantic ocean to the southwest. According to the cabled account, from innumerable eggs there appear tiny larva; called leptocephali, which are transparent, jellylike and flat, having something of the contour of a tailless herring. It is not known how long the eggs take to develop the leptocephali, but the latter occupy six months in transition to the familiar elvers, which are about 2 inches long. The elvers then migrate in countless swarms to the shores of western Europe, traveling in columns sometimes several yards wide and miles tong. Nothing stops their progress. If they encounter a ship they separate to t.he right and left and rejoin in the vessel's wake. They invade every river and waterway on the coasts, ascending steadily landward. They even ascend small waterfalls, penetrate streams and wriggle over swamp grounds into ponds and ditches.