The eel wins the prize as having the most interesting life as a fish. After about 8-12 years in freshwater the eel heads out to sea, making a few body changes as it does so, setting off on a 5 year arduous journey where it eventually arrives at the Sargasso sea, where it spawns and then sadly dies. The young elvers then take roughly 4 years to return to freshwater and so the cycle begins again.

Eels hunt by their sense of smell, and feed at night so there is no need for fine tackle. Line should be of at least 10lb breaking strain as eels can easily bite through thin line. Eels live in all locations but if you are looking to catch a large specimen it maybe helpful to keep an eye on your local angling press so that you can concentrate on a particularly success location.

As with catfish, eels are scavengers and the best plan is to deadbait or bunch lobworms on the bottom close to the margins, where the fish like to hunt at night. Use small deadbait such as roach, gudgeon or minnows, you can slash them so that their juices run out allowing the eel to use his excellent sense of smell to find them.