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Electric eel in 2023: Pet-trade watch

[185] [more-electric-eel-85] is account of horses herded into a pool of eels became a European science anecdote. Later readers treated it a A 2019 Nature Communications paper split Electrophorus into three: E. electricus, E. voltai and E. varii. Volt A specimen label at a natural history museum records where and when, not which animal is more valuable. For Electric eel, write 2023, “Pet-trade watc

A 2019 Nature Communications paper split Electrophorus into three: E. electricus, E. voltai and E. varii. Voltage and DNA both argued for the split. E. voltai has been measured near 860 V. That is a prey-stun and defence pulse, not a household-current analogy that holds in every tank.

What did Humboldt actually do in 1800? His account of horses herded into a pool of eels became a European science anecdote. Later readers treated it as a method; it was also travel theatre. Did electric eels inspire the battery? Volta and Galvani debates used animal electricity. Electrophorus was a New World exhibit in that argument, not the sole inventor of the pile.

A high-voltage volley can freeze prey; a weaker field maps the night water. Kenneth Catania high-speed videos in the 2010s showed doublets that twitch hidden fish. Are they Least Concern because they shock people? No. LC reflects a wide Amazon-Orinoco footprint. Dams, drought and capture are local, not a comic-book immunity.

The order on the card is year, line, figure. Electric eel is not sorted by how much visitors like the photo.2023

Figures to keep

Year of the note
2023
Figure to keep
860
Species
Electric eel
Line in the log
Pet-trade watch

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