The Philippine 

 Journal of Science 



AUGUST, 1923 



A REVIEW OF THE EELS OF THE PHILIPPINE 

 ARCHIPELAGO 



Chief, Division of Fisheries, Bureau of Science, Manila 



ELEVEN PLATES AND FOURTEEN TEXT FIGURES 



This review contains descriptions of all the eels, or apodal 

 fishes, known from the Philippine Archipelago. Two orders are 

 here treated, although the first order may have no real affinity 

 with the true eels. The first order contains two genera and two 

 species; the second order, twenty-three genera and sixty-one 

 species, including one new genus and eight new species. The 

 eel-like catfishes, blennies, and gobies, more or less abundant in 

 the streams and along the coasts of the Philippines, are not here 

 considered. 



The eels form a readily recognizable group, although until the 

 skeletal characters are better known we cannot be certain that 

 we have not grouped together some unrelated families under the 

 larger of the two orders here treated. While all eels are more 

 or less edible, some of them, especially the Anguillidse, or fresh- 

 water eels, and the congers, are much esteemed and form an 

 important part of the food supply of the Islands. Eels are 

 caught with nets, in the ever-present baclad, or fish corral and 

 with hook and line, and they occur in large numbers at times 

 in the bangos fishponds about Manila Bay, but most of them are 

 captured with some form of hobo, or woven bamboo trap. 



As would naturally be surmised, the eels of the Philippines 

 are East Indian, most of the species occurring from India to the 

 South Sea Islands. In spite of their great abundance about the 



