I found two complete specimens of Obovaria retusa, still
> relatively fresh despite their apparent age.  The freshwater enthusiasts on > this list will understand when I tell you that I literally cried when I left the site and had to leave the specimens there on the Indiana shore.   What a waste.
>
> Doug Shelton
 
Dear Shellers:
 
One of the pleasures of living in the area of Merritt Island, Florida,
where conch-l'rs Bobby and Jim Cordy and Marlo Krisberg also live, is
that we watch (are are awakened before 4 am this morning for the noise
of the rocket wash from the Space Shuttle launch.) It is spectacular in
sight and sound!
 
Therefore, the joy of seeing human ingenuity in science and applied
technology such as a space launch is mitigated by the sad tale from Doug
Shelton of probably well intentioned regulators thinking they are
preserving mollusca when they are contributing to just the opposite.
How do you know what to protect (or even find out what is still there?)
without verifyable surveys. (You also have the problem as so many
freshwater spp. look so much alike a photograph would not necessarily
identify the spp.-although I know Doug Shelton probably was walking
about two feet in the air when he saw Obovaria retusa, outside of there
and part of the Green River and one or two small areas, that poor
species is in bad shape for future survival.)
 
Freshwater collecters (the 14 of us left) have all seen:
-Fishermen taking mussels for bait (not a terrible resource depletion,
but in many areas illegal)-No science there.
-Kids picking up live mussels, leaving them exposed on hot sun drenched
sand banks where the shells will soon die.
-In rural areas, four wheel drive vehicles doing doing 'donuts' in the
gravel, and otherwise destroying habitats.
-dams (siltation, release of bottom super cold water, turbulence,
turbitity, etc.).
-gravel operations (many beds destroyed that way).
-housing, business and other destruction of the shoreline, and
accompanying pollution, including
-spills from barges, etc.
-Muskrat and other predator middens of shells (Muskrats do not know they
should not take juvenile shells, nor do they seem to be knowledgeable
not to take endangered shell spp. for food).
 
You are all familiar with the introduced insults to the freshwaters in
the U.S., the Corbicula from Asia in the west, midwest and south; and
Dreissena from Europe from the north and midwest all the way down the
Mississippi River.  You would think that would prompt an urgency by
states to document what is there now, not put roadblocks in the way.
 
Now who is surveying this resource-
We have a few scientific freshwater people on the list suchas Tom
Watters, Kevin Cummings, Supershellers of extraordinary talent and
ability Harry Lee and Doug Shelton, Marion Havlik diligently working in
the not so frozen north this season, and several universities but these
folks are relatively few and far between and certainly limited by their
budgets and limited federal funding- who is there to pick up the slack?
 
I wish I could all take you on a shelling trip to Indiana.  I lived
there for a while, but that state like Illinois and Michigan probhibit
taking DEAD shells.  I bet I could find you a single valve of an
endangered spp, mud encased, wash off the mud to find the interior
chalky white (in other words dead for ages) and not be able to take that
valve, or a fresher specimen, with the muskrat scratches to demonstrate
it was not taken live by those 'evil shellers' with green algae on the
interior nacre (which does not come off), and you can not take it.
None of those would you as a sheller even give a second look at-the
shell wouldn't be worth picking up even to skip across the water, but
you couldn't take it.
 
I obey the law, I have seen endangered spp. in 2" of water near islands
in rivers, which I have reasonable suspicion will be exposed from
falling water within a day.  You think I am going to pick that up and
place it (carefully, I know how to do that) in a little deeper water- no
way (and unfortunately these shells get stranded and die all too often
from falling water).  That shell, I am sure as I have seen other
examples many times, either died within a few days are was a treat for a
maurauding muskrat.  But in this case the law in Indiana is what
Dicken's Oliver Twist said it was (please forgive the rudeness of
Charles Dicken's language)"If this be the law, then the law is an ass."
 
former Hoosier from Jeffersonville, Indiana
Alan Gettleman
Merritt Island, FL