Hello, Listers!

In the days when fresh water mussels were abundant I used to go to the fishing access at Times Beach, Missouri (yes, the infamous Times Beach that had the dioxin brouhaha).  There was a shallow places with a mud/sand bottom off the gravel bar where one could sit for hours on hundreds of shells and easily harvest the best shells.  I have not made an exact count of everything I collected there, but it would be between 15 and 20 species, not counting the little pea-sized shells from slightly farther upstream in an inch or two of water.  I have never been able to i.d. them; they could be juveniles newly dropped from their fish host or the "finger clams" that were adults.

Sadly, they dredged out the place to make boating easier (sic) (really "sick" too), and the introduced Corbicula, zebra mussel, and overfarming in the region took their toll.  There are some Niades left, but looking for them would require a boat, and the Meramec river is a very dangerous place to swim - much undertow and other erratic currents.  So my fresh water shelling days are gone.  I really miss it!

If there was Dioxin in the river, I saw no evidence of it in the mussel population and have not suffered any ill effects (yet) from hours of sitting in the water.

Cheers,
Linda

----------------------------------------------------------------------
[log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs
To leave this list, click on the following web link:
http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1
Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and
click leave the list.
----------------------------------------------------------------------