Genoa  Higgins Eye

How many of us think of clams?  They are not really a pet but they are our next story.
Theres a good reason why we do care about clams.

Missing Mussels photojournalist Mike Caseman

There a good reason why we do care about clams.

Unless they are on a half shell, most of us dont think much about clams

Roger Gordon, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service: Thats a question we get a lot. Why do we spend money on mussels, Its not walleye, its not something that the public uses.

Unlike other creatures, mussels dont run or fly or even swim. Theres no poetry in motion. Its such a tussle to rhyme with mussel.

Tony Brady: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service: They have a fascinating life cycle. These mussels sit there on the river bottom. They dont move a whole lot.

Aristotle once said in all things of nature, there is something of a marvel. Behold the marvelous Higgins eye mussel.

Tony Brady: These mussels being native to the river are basically the natural filtering system for the river. They help pull impurities out of the river. They help keep the water clean

The Higgins Eye today is one of Americas famous clams. But for a reason unfortunate.

Susan Oetker: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service:  The Higgins Eye is an indicator species for whats been going on with mussels in the Upper Mississippi River.

Since 1976 the Higgins Eye, which lives in the Mississippi River and Tributaries, is about as close to extinction as any creature can get. Pollution, siltation and an alien, the zebra mussel, are the culprits.

Roger Gordon: We were in that bad a shape when the zebra mussels hit that we were very worried that we were going to lose this species from the earth.

Mike Davis, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources: When the zebra mussels get on them, they block those apertures so the zebra mussels are filtering out the food and oxygen before it gets to the native mussel. And when they build up in thick enough numbers, it totally chokes them off and they suffocate. And after they suffocate then you end up with one like this where its died and the shell is just empty now.

Susan Oetker: Right now we are marking the mussels with black dots so we know that came from this project.

Since 1999, State and Federal Wildlife Officials, led by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, have had a battle cry  Save the Higgins Eye.

Susan Oetker:  I think that if we werent out here doing this, Higgins Eye would definitely go down the tubes.

The good news is the Higgins Eye now has a future that wasnt there a few years ago.

Roger Gordon: Weve stocked well over two and a half million animals into the Upper Midwest already and we plan this year to stock over three million.

Tony Brady: What Im doing is getting ten un-infested fish from this tank

Restoring the Higgins Eye begins with the fish mouth bass or walleye

Tony Brady: This is the clam palace which we affectionately call Clam Palace and this is where we house the mussel recovery program. The mussel holds the glochidia in her gills and she naturally ruptures her gills to force the glochidia out. So were just mimicking that by injecting water into the gill to force the glochidia out of the mussel.

Roger Gordon:  Right now we are just drawing up a solution of these larvae and we are going to introduce them to these buckets. We introduce these glochidia to these buckets and as the fish breathe they go across the gills of the fish and they are going to clamp on. We are introducing thousands of these baby mussels right now. A lot of mussels into this bucket. We hope to attach hundreds per fish. (looking into a microscope, Oh wow, we have hundreds.

Tony Brady: Thats a mussel here and up in here. The little white specks that you see against the red of the gill, those are actually the larval mussel attached to the gill.

Once fish gill, which amounts to Higgins Eye baby, the fish are placed in captive pens in Lake Pepin on the Mississippi.

Tony Brady: When mussels drop off the fish they sit at the bottom of the cages, so when we open the top of the cage, the fish swim out but the mussels stay in the bottom of the cage. Well grow them out here for another year to two years to get some size on them, and they are scheduled to be stocked in areas where there are few zebra mussels.

In essence, the recovery crew replicates the clams reproductive process.

Tony Brady: Weve produced over two million transformed mussels off fish. Over ten thousand of them have come out of cages. And over the last couple of years we have released over thirty five hundred two to three year old mussels for restorative efforts.

Roger Gordon: Weve had an ongoing cage project up here since I believe two thousand and one. We are actually working with the two thousand and three class of mussels and we are going to begin to spread them out in the Upper Mississippi River and some of its larger tributaries. We have a good chance of if not saving the species but removing it from the endangered species list.

The return of the Higgins Eye wont make a Hollywood movie and perhaps not even newspaper headlines. Its not poetic, the clam but its survival is ours  ours to give a dam.