Why Atlantic Canada rules the squirmy big business of baby eels

Article content

During his lifetime, Philip Holland was known as a dedicated Crown prosecutor who put the bad guys behind bars.

But his legacy could very well be the lucrative baby eel industry he started in Canada under the most modest of circumstances, keeping the tiny, squirmy critters he had plucked from cold New Brunswick rivers alive in plastic tubs in his basement before shipping them to Asia.

Article content

When Holland died of colon cancer at age 51 in February 2003, prosecutors and police showed their respect by organizing a long drive-by at Holland’s Rothesay home and closing Crown prosecutor’s offices in neighbouring Saint John, Hampton and St. Stephen for a day.

In the newspaper article that told of his passing, nothing was written about his zeal for baby eel fishing. His official obituary only mentioned juvenile eels, or elvers, in three sentences.

“He had a life-long interest in fishing and the ocean,” it stated.

And yet, more than two decades after his death and 36 years since he was granted an experimental licence to capture glass eels, the elver industry in Atlantic Canada has become deliriously successful, worth millions.

It’s been bittersweet for his family, who have seen the business success lead to a free-for-all on the rivers in the springtime, with licence holders battling First Nations members and poachers for the best spots.

Fearing the worst, the federal fisheries minister shut down the industry in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia three times in the last five years, with new rules expected to be in force this spring.

Article content

It’s a far cry from a few plastic tubs in Holland’s basement.

“I initially thought of his projects as a hobby until he began spending money, which I at first questioned,” says his widow, Mary Ann Holland, who was married to Phil for 26 years and now runs the family elver business. “He got very little sleep and used his holiday time for travel to promote the ‘project.’”

Raised in Newfoundland, her husband came from a large family with the ocean in their blood. His sister’s in-laws were pioneers in salmon pen aquaculture and his brother was a biologist who worked with a professor at the University of New Brunswick pioneering salmon smolt aquaculture. His father was part of the growing business of shipping live lobster by air.

While practising law, Holland wanted to get into the fishing business. His first plan was to build a freshwater smolt hatchery to get more Atlantic salmon to aquaculture buyers in the Bay of Fundy, who had few restrictions on putting in cages in saltwater but couldn’t find enough stock for the hungry, growing market.

Failing to get approval for the hatchery, Holland fell back on another species that had captured his imagination at the at the Huntsman Marine Science Centre in St. Andrews: Anguilla rostrata, or the American eel.

Article content

Article content

Eels had been fished throughout the world and were an important part of diet in China, Korea and Japan. But much of their stock came from Europe, where eels were already in decline.

In Canada, eels had traditionally been harvested as adults by Indigenous communities to be eaten right away. There was no industry for catching them by the thousands in the glass eel stage as juveniles and raising them in tanks to adulthood.

Eels in the Atlantic Ocean breed in the warm waters of the Sargasso Sea, near Bermuda. Before they die, each female releases millions of eggs that quickly hatch, with the tiny eels floating along the currents to rivers in North America and Europe. As part of this incredibly long journey, the hatchlings metamorphose into the prized baby eels, often called glass eels because they are translucent, thin like yarn and only a few centimetres long.

The eels then fight up the rivers in the annual migration. The ones that avoid nets and dams make their homes in the rivers for up to 20 years, before they mature and take the long journey back to the Sargasso Sea to begin the life cycle again, a more than 2,000-kilometre round trip.

Article content

In the late 1980s, Holland obtained the country’s first experimental license to catch elvers, and he and his wife incorporated Brunswick Aquaculture.

Catching the critters isn’t for the faint hearted. It must be done in the spring months when the waters are high and icy cold, with handheld nets or fyke nets, a cylinder of netting wrapped around a series of hoops to create a trap.

To learn more about the industry, Philip travelled to Great Britain to observe the glass eel fishery methods and gear on the River Severn that straddles England and Wales.

He also made his way to Hong Kong, China and Taiwan to meet potential buyers.

Mary Ann said one of the challenges he encountered was unscrupulous traders who mixed American eel stock from a small fishery in Maine with the traditional Japanese eel variety of Asia, which is endangered.
Because the two species flourish in different temperatures, the American eels wouldn’t do well and would often die.

“The American eel elver became known as something to avoid from unscrupulous buyers,” Mary Ann said. “So, part of these early years was educating the Asian farmers that with a different technique the American eel could survive.”

Article content

Caught as glass eels, they are packed in a plastic bag with a little water, sort of like taking a goldfish home from the pet store, before being shipped by air freighter to Asia. Kept at the right temperature, they can survive if they get to their destination within 50 hours. Then they are grown in captivity till adulthood, destined for sushi markets in Asia and North America.

Initially, Philip Holland could only get about $50 a kilogram for his glass elvers.

As business grew, he travelled again to England and the Netherlands in 1994 to research eel aquaculture recirculation systems, technology that recycles and filters as little water as possible.

“We operated first with plastic tubs in our basement, then out of a garage, then in 1994 purchased land in Pennfield in southwestern New Brunswick to build a holding facility and a turn-key aquaculture recirculation system to hold and grow elvers,” says Mary Ann.

A lawyer who’d met her husband during their university years, Mary Ann incorporated Alder Seafood Ltd. in 1994 for the sales part of the job, using her own savings to hire an engineer and biologist to set up the new recirculation system in Pennfield.

Article content

“Phil and I were partners. Because we had young children, I did not fish much in the early years, although I did some. One time, we were approached by an eel fishing association in Quebec for elvers to stock in Lac Moran. I delivered the elvers using the first stocking as an opportunity for my youngest daughter to have a French-speaking road trip.”

We operated first with plastic tubs in our basement

Mary Ann Holland, Alder Seafood

Both of their daughters, Margaret and Catherine, fished for elvers and when old enough, helped manage the companies until they moved on with their careers. A son-in-law is still in the business.

During Philip’s lifetime, prices for eels were subpar, and Mary Ann says their business often lost money. But eventually the hard work paid off.

In 2012, the UN Convention in Trade in Endangered Species banned the trade on the European eel outside its home range, making it illegal to sell that species to China.

The black market thrived, and the price for American eels — which are also threatened in Ontario and other parts of North America — began their steady climb.

Thanks to the Hollands’ initial success, the fishery also spread to eight other licence holders and an Indigenous fishery, most of it in Nova Scotia.

Article content

Mary Ann built a processing plant for shipping eels in 2014 and eventually put in enough accommodation to house more than a dozen staff during the all-important spring run.

Her licence allowed her to capture more than 1,000 kg of elvers on 14 river estuaries in Musquash and Charlotte counties in southwestern New Brunswick.

Business, she said, peaked three years ago, when she employed 28 people, including 23 harvesters, a cook, three net makers, and an administrative assistant who also served as a fish weigher.

By that point, the price for kilo was close to $5,000 and revenues were in the millions, making elvers the most lucrative seafood by weight in Canada.

Holland isn’t happy with what’s happened on the water since then – she’s alleged in lawsuits that Ottawa and First Nations are conspiring to take away her business without compensation, a notion Indigenous leader reject. They say their people have an Aboriginal and treaty right to fish in their traditional territory.

But Holland remains hopeful for the industry and believes the species can thrive in New Brunswick, despite the decline of eels elsewhere.

“There is a lot of growth potential for this industry,” she said, mentioning that the fishery could be expanded to other rivers, with aquaculture creating more value-added products.

“But the rule of law is required to assure stability.”

Brunswick News

Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here.

Article content