Scientists from ICAR-National Bureau of Fish Genetic Resources, working on India's fish genetic resources for intellectual property protection and sustainable utilisation, have discovered a new species of eel from among specimen collected from the Kalamukku fishing harbour near Kochi city.
The newly discovered eel belongs to the congrid eels group and has been named Ariosoma Maurostigma (Two-spot short tail conger). The species name was derived from two Greek words - ‘mauro’, which means dark, and ‘stigma’, which means mark, referring to the black dark mark on the posterodorsal margin of the eyes.
The NBFGR confirmed this as a new species after a thorough taxonomic and molecular analysis and the findings have appeared in the international journal, Fish Biology. The Fish Biology paper, ‘A new species of the congrid eel genus Ariosoma (Anguilliformes:Congridae) from the south-west coast of India’, has been published by Kuldeep Kumar Lal, Thipramalai Thangappan Pillai Ajith Kumar, Paramasivam Kodeeswaran, Anil Mohapatra and Arulraj Dhinakaran.
The new species is 181–295 mm long and is distinct for its grey and shiny body colour with dark mark or spot on the posterodorsal margin of the eyes. The Fish Biology paper said the eel species is described on the basis of 24 specimens collected from the deep-sea trawl by-catch from the Kalamukku fishing harbour.
NBFGR sources said fishermen, who were involved in catching the eel, described the eel as non-poisonous. It was caught from 200–400 m depth along the Arabian Sea. They live in unusual habitats like continental slope and underwater seamount crevices. The species is possibly distributed along the south-west coast of India, including the coastal waters of Kerala, Karnataka and Goa.
The biology and nutritional status of the species is under study. The newly identified eel is the sixth species of congrid eels that have been documented from the Indian waters. All of them have been landed as by-catch in trawl landings. Most of the eel groups do not possess economic value and are landed as by-catch. And sampling of these groups have been rare in Indian waters. These by-catch are used as ingredients for poultry feeds and concealing these groups from taxonomic assessment has led to biodiversity loss.
Based on this experience, extensive sampling is a prerequisite to understand the entire aspects of the eel group and biodiversity along the Indian coast and islands. This in turn will additionally afford detailed insights into the diversity, ecology, and evolution of these eel groups, NBFGR sources added.
