Mysterious creature found in Cayman Brac

T J Sevik, tour guide for Cayman Brac, was able to
capture, for identification, the very slippery creature

Thursday, April 1, 2004

What started out as a bird-watching venture ended with visitors and Brac residents ‘scratching their heads’ over a mysterious species of eel that was found in the salt-water marsh across from Divi Tiara Beach Resort.

Tour guide T J Sevik had taken a group of bird-watchers on tour to the site of the land-locked pond when one of the group members pointed to a snake like creature making its way in the shallows close to shore.

T J’s said: “The man helped me corral the creature into the shallower water and I was able to catch it with my hands. We’ve taken it to all the dive masters and no-one had seen such a creature before.”

The 29-inch long specimen was taken to Grand Cayman for identification by the Department of Environment (DoE). Acting Director of the DoE, Scott Slaybaugh turned to his experts in taxonomy, Phil Bush and Gene Parsons to research the species. In their research, it was determined that it was indeed an eel species and not a fish.

Mr Parsons said: “Through our resources, we identified the eel as anguill rostrata or commonly named the American eel. Though it is not often seen because of its nocturnal nature, its lives in a vast range, but very commonly found throughout the US and especially around the Coastal Plain of the Carolina states.

“Its territories cover the entire Atlantic coast to Newfoundland, Canada, south to Brazil and can be found in the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico. It is a very unusual creature to find and Mr Bush recalled having one brought in before from a marl pit. The eel has the ability to crawl and avoid obstacles in or out of inland waterways.”

“It is this unique feature that usually causes a stir. The animal is also uniquely catadromous in its spawning habits. That means they are freshwater by nature yet they seek out the ocean environment to spawn.

“They are the only North American freshwater eel that are catadromous. Their spawning habits are opposite that of the salmon, which spawns in freshwater then lives its adult life in the sea which is called anadromous.”

The American eel is not an endangered or threatened species in the US though there is concern about over-harvesting. Most of the commercial catch is exported to the European and Asian markets.

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