The number of known eel species in Taiwan has increased to 207, making the nation one of the habitats with the highest biodiversity of eels, researchers said.
The tally was reached after the discovery of a new genus, 29 new species and 13 endemic species.
The findings were published in the International science journal Zootaxa on Thursday.
The research was conducted by National Museum of Marine Biology and Aquarium researcher Ho Hsuan-ching (何宣慶) and his team.
The team was comprised of 14 scientists from Taiwan, Japan, the US, Malaysia, Australia, Vietnam and Thailand.
Japanese eel and pike conger are well-known among Taiwanese, but the research revealed that Taiwan is home to several endemic species, such as the newly discovered Taiwanese worm eel Sympenchelys taiwanensis) and the Taiwanese arrowtooth eel (Dysomma taiwanensis), Ho said.
Taiwanese researchers have identified a total of 42 new eel species, an impressive amount comprising one-fifth of all eel species, Ho said, adding that 23 of the newly found species are endemic to Taiwan.
The variety of eels in Taiwan has surpassed that of Japan, the Philippines and Australia, Ho said, adding that there are more data to be compiled and published.
Newly discovered endemic species included the long-bodied snake eel (Ophichthus shaoi), the bicolored snake eel (Ophichthus bicolor) and the many-vertebrae snake eel (Echelus polyspondylus), increasing the number of species of the Ophichthidae family known to exist in Taiwan to 60, Ho said.
“It also marks Taiwan as the nation with the most amount of species in a family,” Ho said.
The researchers found that previous studies had mixed up the scientific names of many eels, Academia Sinica researcher Shao Kwang-tsao (邵廣昭) said, adding that global cooperation allowed them to quickly resolve the problem.
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