My buddy had one for a 6 months untill the aquarium heater malfunctioned, with a little bit of aquarium salt, and the eel always seemed to be healthy They seem to do well on live feeders as well, and his preferred to eat at night. I would say keeping a hiding place is essential, his spent most of the time in it but when he got real hungry he would just come out and sit there waiting for feeders. As far as finding them in New York or not, I guess it just depends on where, in terms of PA, OH, and western NY I have only seen them for sale twice. Good luck, they are cool fish.