EELS 369 



trunks with litter or hay during a thunderstorm, or all his 

 eels will go white and slimy, and die. They cannot stand 

 thunder, though it is said they (and tench) will live out of 

 water a week. 



On the Waveney they use eel-pods, beginning to put them 

 in at the end of March. These picturesque pods are made 

 of osiers, and measure four feet in length by nine inches in 

 girth at the centre, tapering to four inches in circumference at 

 the ends. They are constructed on the principle of a bow- 

 net, baited with a worm on a rush, and put in on coarse 

 blowy nights. 



Special bow-nets, with a small (shale) mesh net, are used 

 for catching eels too. They are baited with roach, and put 

 in close by where the roach and bream are spawning. 



Besides the proper eel-sets, the millmen put nets into 

 the dikes below the out-casts. This is done in the month 

 of July, or earlier, if the weather has been warm, and a 

 heavy fall of rain has fallen ; for the eels work out of the 

 banks after heavy rains, and begin to run. They will some- 

 times work out of the ooze, and run in mild days in winter 

 after a heavy rain. 



The silver-bellied eels begin to move seaward in Sep- 

 tember, as is well known, returning the following spring 

 to spawn on the flats of Breydon at least so say the men 

 of Breydon ; whereas I believe the broad-nosed eel spawns 

 in a weed called " lamb's tail," to be found on most of the 

 broads and in the dikes. I have seen this weed full of 

 elvers. 



Of course many of the Broadsmen say eels " young ; " and 

 one old man says he tells by looking into an eel's mouth 

 whether it has young, and he is fully convinced he has taken 

 sixteen young elvers out of an eel. 



But one thing seems certain about the eel : he is capital 

 eating. A nice silver-bellied eel, from half a pound to a pound 

 weight, is the sweetest fish to eat, as a salt-water eel like the 

 Breydon eel is the most delicately flavoured. Whilst living 



2 A 



