Critically endangered juvenile #eels trying to find a way upstream at Ardnacrusha hydro station on the Lower River Shannon, June 2016. Elvers can’t find this trap/pass. The spillway beside this trap is far more attractive […]
Expert advice on glass eel, elver, yellow eel and silver eel management issues
Author: Dr. Will O'Connor
Dr. Will O’Connor is a Senior Ecologist who has over 25 year’s professional experience. He is a graduate of the University of Wales, Cardiff, and the National University of Ireland, Galway. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, and a full member of both the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management and the Institute of Fisheries Management. He is a Chartered Environmentalist and a Chartered Biologist.
Ireland’s Eel Management Plan – a poor deal for eels
Ireland’s Eel Management Plan – a poor deal for eels. Action 3a: Castletown Weir 2015. This is the new rock ramp fish pass at Castletown Weir on the River Nore. This provides a local improvement […]
As few as 2% of elvers may pass Shannon dams
It has recently been reported by Ireland’s independent scientific committee on salmon that the numbers of Annex II listed Atlantic salmon passing the dams on the River Shannon is less than 5% of the conservation […]
Monitoring silver eel turbine passage mortalities on the Lower Shannon
We are currently assessing silver eel turbine passage mortality at Ardnacrusha hydroelectric station on the Lower River Shannon. Silver eels are adult maturing eels on their spawning migration to the Sargasso Sea after spending up to 20 years (or […]
Genetic analysis of the American eel helps explain its decline
An interesting paper entitled ‘RAD Sequencing Highlights Polygenic Discrimination of Habitat Ecotypes in the Panmictic American Eel‘ was recently published in the journal Current Biology by Scott A. Pavey et al. (2015). This study has found that there are differences […]
Historical data to plan the recovery of the European eel
A new interesting paper has been accepted by the Journal of Applied Ecology entitled ‘Historical data to plan the recovery of the European eel‘. The authors are Miguel Clavero and Virgilio Hermoso who use historical sources to reconstruct the historical […]
Salmon counters – unnecessary eel migration barriers?
Instead of opening up migration pathways for eels (and lampreys) in Ireland, our state agency Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) are, themselves, a major threat to eel and lamprey populations. In 2013 IFI installed this crump […]
Ireland’s elver monitoring sites not operating again
We are very disappointed to report that many of Ireland’s national elver monitoring sites are not operational again this year in time for the elver run. This weekend we visited Inland Fisheries Ireland’s elver monitoring […]
Endoparasites affect eel swimming behaviour
A new paper entitled ‘Relationship between European eel Anguilla anguilla infection with non-native parasites and swimming behaviour on encountering accelerating flow‘ has just been published in the Journal of Fish Biology by Lynda Newbold et al. It examines […]
ESB’s elver trap at Ardnacrusha: 1997 and 2014 compared
The 2014 juvenile eel catch on the River Shannon (from both Ardnacrusha and Parteen weir) came to only 354 Kg. This was only about 5% of the peak catches from these sites in the 1980’s, […]
