The Japanese eel (Anguilla japonica) has been considered one of the important marine reproductive migratory fish in East Asia. To understand the the block of initial ovarian development in pubertal female eels during early reproduction, we used Illumina sequencing technology (HiSeq2000) to sequence and compare the transcriptomic response of previtellogenic ovary in female Japanese eel after salmon pituitary homogenate (SPH) injections.