Moray Eel Attack

[Diver Dennis]

When we feed Morays now we use Goggle Eyes which are part of their diet. Kwbryon is correct when he says that they do start to associate divers with food and it does not take that many feedings for this to happen. That is why we only feed away from the areas divers frequent now and not often.
In the town of Banff the Elk can be very dangerous, not due to feeding but familiarity with humans. They have no fear and literally walk anywhere they want to in town. Familiarity with humans happens to territorial marine life without feeding and can produce the same results.

 

[DennisW]

Hey Dennis, how about posting article and pics of said attack?

Dave (aka "Squirt")

Dave, the link in the first post has the article you are asking to see.

Feeding wildlife is never a good idea. It makes the wildlife associate people with food. When an animal with a brain the size of a pea thinks you are there to give it food and you don't, you may get hurt. One of the reasons it's illegal to feed alligators in Florida.

I've heard some people say that you aren't altering the animal's behavior if you feed them. That's just total hogwash. Just being there alters their behavior (we are not naturally under water in their environment), what would you think feeding them will do.

The Green Moray on th eSea Emporer has been there for years. It likes to swim around the divers and, as far as I know, has never hurt anyone. That eel will swim spirals around you.

 

[Chaseh]

I wasn't trying to incite the discussion about feeding on dives. It's been done enough times.

There isn't evidence here though to show that that's what caused the attack, and we shouldn't just leap to that conclusion, especially if it simply acts to back up you're own arguements.

 

[DennisW]

I wasn't trying to incite the discussion about feeding on dives. It's been done enough times.

There isn't evidence here though to show that that's what caused the attack, and we shouldn't just leap to that conclusion, especially if it simply acts to back up you're own arguements.

You are probably right. Maybe I should have not discussed the issue. However the original post indicated that the sea life in that particular area had been fed by people in the past. Something I think is a really bad thing to do.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Hand feeding wild animals promotes a dependence on us for food, opposed to fending for them selfs. They will associate humans more and more with food and become increasingly more aggressive to get it from us. Not only are they less capable of surviving on their own, the food we give them is often not part of their normal diet, and can cause them to get sick.

This is true, even in your local area. There are several dive sites here where divers regularly feed the wolf eels. Most times they're using herring or green urchins ... but a few years back there was a wolf eel at Octopus Hole (Hood Canal) that got used to being fed hot dogs. Poor thing ... I wouldn't even feed those nasty things to a human. Anyway ... got to the point where if you fed him an urchin he'd chomp into it ... then spit it out. He'd developed a taste for hot dogs, apparently ... :11:

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[RumBum]

1) and uncontrolled ascent from 100 ft?? that has to be more life-threatening than an eel bite
2) Aside from not supporting an unhealthy population of marine life, this is probably the best argument for not feeding creatures while scuba diving.
3) what would you have done in the same situation?

1. this eel is reported to be 1.5 meters (almost 5 feet). That's not a monster, but he's big enough to put a hurtin on ya. A small dive knife may just pi$$ him off. I sure wouldn't leisurely paddle around with an eel in my arm.

2. funny that the eel just attacked unprovoked (according to the bitten diver?) I would guess that if he was totally unprovoked then feeding probably did play a part in this behavior.

3. I have had a green moray rare up on me. He was maybe 6.5 feet. I flared, froze, and breathed in some air to slowly ascend. He looked at me for a minute and then settled down and swam away. Lesson learned - no matter how much I want to see the moray I will never chase it.

 

[IceIce]

I try not to touch any fish unless they come to me or react to my invitation. I also dived with moray eels many times up to monster size, but only encountered one agressive moray. I was spotting a nudibranch and showing it to my friends, then out of some rock, a yellow moray (small size, about 4 feet long) came out and bit his camera strobe. When it found out that it didn't taste nice, it went under the rock again.

After that, my instructor went to the same spot (we have moved to others), he lifted some rocks to find boxer crabs. When he was in the way of lifting that rock, the moray bit his index finger and shook it like a dog tearing a cloth. He had to shake his hand really hard to let it go. We didn't see the incident, he was bleeding quite intesely.

Lifting the rock might pissed that moray off, but I guess, it had been anxious even before that, and tried to bit everything near its rock.

NarcosisDave is right, I guess if it had really attacked us, we wouldn't be able to react fast, even when it attacked the camera strobe, what we did is just look at it, in slow motion movement.

 

[Mambo Dave]

SLightly off-topic, but since we got lucky recently... A friend and I just got these pictures on Saturday. This little guy was bold enough to be out in the open, but he was also timid and obviously more concerned with not getting attacked than attacking me (based on the interations I had with him, this is difficult to judge from the pictures).

http://www.countryvue.com/MrGreen1.JPG

http://www.countryvue.com/MrGreen2.JPG

http://www.countryvue.com/MrGreen3.JPG

I tested a few things out for effect. I found that closing my eyes for a period had no effect on him (probably explained by the lack of visoion to see my eyes, and/or that the closing of eyes, and eyelids in general, aren't a feature eels have), but when facing each other in another location for a while, and testing out an intentional look-away, he took the opportunity to go under me and get to another part of the wreck. I left him be at that point.

What a beautiful creature to see out of its hole though.

The largest we've seen was what I'd call an easy 9 feet. I tried hard to judge, too, but all I could come up with was that he was longer than any diver plus their fins down there. There was a group looking at his head sticking out of a hole, so I went around them, and down behind the reef only to find a massive cave area where the rest of his body was completely exposed. I'm not sure the Moray realized how exposed he really was, or he probably didn't care. They hide for ambushing fish, not as much to protect themselves when they get that size (from what I can tell).

No one told the Morays get that big, though probably no one I dive with knew that they did. A recent check on a website for green morays listed 8 feet as about maximum. This was off of Fort Lauderdale.

I realized, looking closely at that very thick, long purely-muscular tail that if an eel that size wanted me, an eel that size was gonna have me, and a good sized dive knife didn't mean much despite all the bravado I hear from divers and their shiny toys. Would I fight? Yes, but I'm just sayin'...

Best,

MD

 

[trigfunctions]

Nice pictures Dave. Which wreck was that?

 

[Mambo Dave]

I'd rather not say. :05: