The European eel is one of the most critically endangered fish species in the world, with population collapse raising both conservation and welfare concerns for a species with a remarkable life history.
Eel welfare exists within a population crisis that makes individual welfare considerations inseparable from conservation urgency. Glass eels entering rivers face immediate barriers - weirs and dams that prevent upstream migration force them into unsuitable estuarine habitat. Adult silver eels migrating downstream to spawn face turbine strike mortality at hydroelectric installations. The combination of habitat loss, fishing pressure, and climate disruption has created a population trajectory toward functional extinction in many European river systems. For individual eels, the welfare concerns include handling stress during glass eel fishing (high density collection causes significant mortality), turbine injury during migration, and the chronic stress of restricted movement in fragmented rivers.