HUGE eel in black river?!

[acabtp]

so i was fishing the black river today around chester, standing in the water on the side of a deeper pool working some rainbows, when i notice something big swim between my legs. bent over for a closer look and found the biggest american eel that i have ever seen hanging out between my right leg and a boulder. went an easy 3'.

i popped my phone underwater real quick to try and get a video of it, but it moved off before i could.

i've never seen one that far from a river with easy ocean access, which makes sense, because they are spawned in the ocean. so when it was a tiny little eel it must have come up raritan bay, used the fish ladder, swam up the north branch, up the black river to where i found it? pretty crazy, i thought there were still dams in the way preventing this... i guess it's just like jurassic park taught us... "life finds a way".

the pool had about a 2' waterfall both up and downstream, so this eel may have been living there for quite a while. i guess maybe someday it will head downstream and try to repeat the process.

i really wish that i had been able to get a recording of it. oh well. everybody prefers threads with pictures though, so here's one of the rainbows from today