Our 2014 American eel team has been busy over the last month preparing for our upcoming field season! As mentioned in our previous post, one of our goals this season was to capture juvenile eels using traps. Trapping these individuals allows us to further our understanding of the American eel population in the Ottawa River. With each individual, we will take measurement data (length, weight) as well as implant each individual with a small tag, a PIT (passive integrated transponder) tag which when detected with a specialized PIT reader can display each tag’s unique code – similar to microchips that are implanted in cats and dogs!

Our team decided to make our eel traps or “pots” in house from PVC coated steel meshing – this design is very similar to a conventional minnow trap, a cylinder with a funnel, make from plastic gardening mesh on one end and the other end being closed.

We’ve taken some photos to document the progression of our trap making and deployment!

Eel pots in the making! Rolling the PVC coated steel mesh into cylinders was the first step into making our eel traps
Eel pots in the making! Rolling the PVC coated steel mesh into cylinders was the first step into making our eel traps

 

Funnels were installed in each eel trap for the entry point.
Funnels were installed in each eel trap for the entry point.
All pots were closed off on the opposite end and a small opening was left in order to bait the traps and retreive any captured individuals.  Bungee cords were used to ensure the door remained closed.
All pots were closed off on the opposite end and a small opening was left in order to bait the traps and retrieve any captured individuals. Bungee cords were used to ensure the door remained closed.
We attached floats to our traps before deploying them to ensure that we could find them once again. Definitely colourful and very noticeable!
We attached floats to our traps before deploying them to ensure that we could find them once again. Definitely colourful and very noticeable!
David Browne, Director of Conservation and Breanna Hallihan, summer field biologist, preparing our eel pots for deployment down near Arnprior.  Each trap was baited in hopes to attract eels.
David Browne, Director of Conservation and Breanna Hallihan, summer field biologist, preparing our eel pots for deployment around Arnprior.

 

Success! All our eel pots were deployed and left to sit in the water in hopes to catch eels!
Success! All our eel pots were deployed and left to sit in the water in hopes to catch eels!

We now have our traps set in two locations; near Arnprior around Chats Dam and near Chaudière Falls, in Ottawa. We will continue to monitor these traps throughout the summer in hopes of catching some juvenile eels!