Coming by me yesterday (3/23) on public radio, a feature on, as I heard it, the illegal trade in baby seals. (referring, apparently, to the seal hunt on Canada’s east coast, in which thousands of harp seal pups are clubbed to death for their fur) But the story was actually about baby eels (elvers). Mishearing strikes again.
Meanwhile, the actual story was alarming, but not as distressing as what I heard, since baby eels are astronomically less cute than baby seals.
The eel story. From Wikipedia:
Freshwater eel poaching and smuggling have emerged in recent years as a direct response to the sustained popularity of eels as food combined with the eels’ low population, endangered status, and subsequent protections. Freshwater eel are elongated fish in the Anguillidae family of ray-finned fish. The three most commonly consumed eel species are the Japanese eel (A. japonica), European eel (A. anguilla), and American eel ( A. rostrata).
The life cycle for eels has not been closed in captivity on a sustainable level, and any eel farms rely entirely on wild-caught elvers (juvenile eels). These elvers are caught from their native ranges in North America and Europe and are smuggled into East Asian eel farms, where they are often relabeled as the native Japanese eel to subvert legislation. The eels are smuggled disguised as other cargo, such as luggage or other meat products.
Yes, luggage.
And then on this blog, there’s my 4/2/13 posting “Glass eels”, which turns into an All About Eels posting, from glass eels up to adult eels (“The adults are predators, with rows of sharp teeth” — but delicious, notably as unagi sushi). Images from that posting:
(#1) One gass eel
(#2) An adult American eel
March 24, 2026 at 7:52 am |
And my misreading when the title appeared as a headline in my email was “The illegal trade in baby **seats**”. I took a second imagining non-approved infant car-seats in a black market operation.
March 24, 2026 at 9:35 am |
We could wander far afield from here, with each title evoking a new misreading.