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Eels and Humans pp 129–142Cite as

Freshwater Eels and Humans in Taiwan

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Part of the book series: Humanity and the Sea ((HUMSEA))

Abstract

Freshwater eels (Anguilla spp.) are an important food resource and support large-scale aquaculture in some oriental countries. Taiwan’s climate is ideal for eel stocks living in the wild and for aquaculture. Indeed, the country’s aquaculture industry, which was initiated in the 1960s and peaked in the early 1990s, contributed greatly to Taiwan’s economic development at the time, though much of that production has since been transferred to mainland China. Despite their economic importance to humans, however, many people are not that familiar with eels, so this chapter supplements material presented elsewhere in this book by documenting aspects of eel distribution and biology, mythology, cuisine, etc, in Taiwan.

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Acknowledgements

I thank the National Science Council of the Republic of China for long-term financial support for eel research, Brian Knights and Yu-San Han for providing unpublished data, Nico Jose Leander for producing much of the artwork, and Brian M. Jessop, Chu-Fa Tsai and book series editor Andrew I. L. Payne for comments, including grammatical improvements, on various earlier drafts.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Fisheries Science, National Taiwan University, Taipei, 10617, Taiwan

    Wann-Nian Tzeng

  2. Department of Environmental Biology and Fisheries Science, National Taiwan Ocean University, Keelung, 20224, Taiwan

    Wann-Nian Tzeng

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  1. Wann-Nian Tzeng
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Correspondence to Wann-Nian Tzeng .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept. of Marine Science and Resources, Nihon University College of Bioresource Sciences, Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan

    Katsumi Tsukamoto

  2. The University Museum, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

    Mari Kuroki

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Tzeng, WN. (2014). Freshwater Eels and Humans in Taiwan. In: Tsukamoto, K., Kuroki, M. (eds) Eels and Humans. Humanity and the Sea. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-54529-3_9

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