USGS Scientists Find New Invasive Fish Species ...( outlook would be if the eel becomes a ...)

Swamp eels -- or rice eels as they are sometimes called -- were first discovered in Florida waters in 1997 in two widely separated sites. In late summer 1997, USGS researchers discovered a population of swamp eels while sampling fishes in ditches, canals and streams flowing into Tampa Bay on Florida's Gulf Coast. At about the same time, students from Florida International University in Miami netted several small swamp eels while collecting aquatic plants from an artificial lake just north of Miami. By now, several dozen eels have been found in the Tampa Bay area and several hundred in Miami waterways.

To determine the size and extent of the swamp eel population in Florida, USGS researchers, working with investigators from Florida International University and biologists from the Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commission, are actively searching waters surrounding the two sites where the eels were previously found.

In May, USGS biologists found swamp eels in samples they took throughout a major east-west canal near the Dade-Broward County line, including a site near the canal's border with Everglades marsh habitat. Biologists have not found the Asian swamp eel in interior wetlands of the Everglades or other natural wetland systems, but the interconnectedness of the waterways and the eel's biology pose substantial risks of the species becoming established there, Nico said.

In North America, the species is sometimes kept as an aquarium fish, although scientists can only speculate that the species may have escaped or been released into the state's waters. In 1995, swamp eels were found in several ponds at the Chattahoochee Nature Center north of Atlanta, Ga., but USGS biologists are unaware of any possible links between the Georgia and Florida populations. In Georgia, scientists suspect the swamp eel may have spread to other par
'"/>

Contact: Hannah Hamilton
Hannah_Hamilton@usgs.gov
352-378-8181
United States Geological Survey
25-Jun-1998