### seafood | shellfish:

Mussel
* All mussels possess an organ called the mantle, which soft lining of the mussel's shell.
* Many mussels are tan, brown or black and many shades in between.
* Most mussels accumulate harmful substances
  - are able to use only one or a few kinds of fish as host
  - avoid predators
* Most mussels have negative effects
  - live in water
  - take several years to become reproductively mature
* Some mussels add nutrients
  - can be fairly active
  - cause ecological damage
  - contaminate with acid
  - go into mouths
  - provide nitrogen.
  * live in lakes, rivers, and creeks. They sometimes also live in intertidal areas along coastlines worldwide. They are grouped in different subclasses
* also feed by bringing water through the incurrent siphon and passing it over the gills
  - prey on barnacle larvae
  - tend to rid their tissues of biotoxins faster than other species
* are a bivalve shellfish and a member of the clam family
  - delicacy served in fancy restaurants
  - good staple diet
  - very endangered group
  - waterway's natural filters
  - accidentally gold, owing to the make-up of their shells
* are also a useful ingredient in seafood stews and kindred dishes
  - great in seafood soups or stews, like cioppino or bouillabaisse
  - raw material for the pearl industry
  - vulnerable to dredging and waterway traffic, which can bury a mussel bed in silt
  - an important link in the food chain along the stream
  - best steamed in water, wine or cream broth seasoned with herbs and garlic
  - bivalve mollusks
  - bivalves
  - clams
  - collected from deep water by means of dredges or rakes
  - especially common on stormy, exposed shores
  - excellent biological indicators in part because of their key position in energy cycling
* are extremely sensitive to environmental change
  - vulnerable because of their dependence on fish as larval hosts
* are filter feeders and they eat the plankton, helping to make the water clearer
  - living on a diet of microorganisms gleaned from rich currents
  - which means they help clean the water they live in
  - feeders, sucking in water and food through specialized structures called siphons
  - generally the first animals to be lost when water quality deteriorates
  - host-specific
* are important because they keep the aquatic chain of life in balance
  - to the health of a river ecosystem
  - in a group of invertebrate animals called mollusks
  - normally prey for muskrats, otters, raccoons, and minks
  - one of the easiest species of shellfish to grow
* are one of the most commonly overlooked seafoods on the Oregon coast
  - endangered groups in North America
  - imperiled groups of animals
  - sedentary bivalves
  - sensitive to high turbidity
  - shellfishs
  - susceptible to pollutants such as heavy metals, nutrients and chlorine
  - the dominant competitors for space on many rocky shores
* are the most efficient feeders compared to other shellfish
  - severely threatened group of animals
  - same delicacy often found next to the lobster and shrimp on a seafood buffet
* attach themselves to rocks using a glue that outperforms all synthetic adhesives
  - very tightly
* breathe exclusively with gills.
* can also filter out green-brown algaes, which frequently discolor water.
* can be light tan to deep orange
  - more difficult to cook on a flat rock
* cling to rocks in the high-tide zone covered by water only at high tide.
* continuously pump water through their bodies.
* dominate the European market, at least in terms of quantities sold.
* feed on algae, which are partly responsible for the cloudiness of lake water.
* frequently occur in large colonies, forming mussel beds.
* grow very slowly.
* have a short shelf life
  - top and a bottom
  - gills and eat plankton
  - important functions in aquatic environments
* ingest toxin but are unaffected.
* inhabit an area between high tide and low tide called the intertidal zone.
* integrate conditions over weeks and months.
* like to eat mostly fine organic material and plankton.
* live in lakes , rivers , and creeks
* open their valves to feed.
* pick up and store toxic pollutants from the water.
* play an important role in the aquatic ecosystem.
* reproduce in spring and afterwards become depleted of flesh.
* require clean, clear water and silt-free gravel or cobble to survive.
* respond to changes in water quality.
* secrete elastic byssal threads to secure their shells
  - glue proteins to attach themselves to rocks
  - strong threads that tether to rocks, docks, boats, and the shells of other animals
* seem to have nothing in common with other molluscs.
* serve as indicators of a river s health
  - critical trophic and non-trophic roles in the functioning of riverine ecosystems
* shells within the same species closely resemble one anothers.
* shoot eggs into the water to spawn.
* stick to the rocks by extruding filaments stronger than steel.
* tend to wipe out other species in certain intertidal zones.
* tie themselves to rocks with strong byssal threads.
* try to tie up attacking snails with their byssus threads.
* use an amazing variety of strategies to attract host fish to their larvae
  - gills like fishes to breathe underwater
* usually form dense colonies in rock pools, on logs, or at the base of boulders
  - congregations on rock
* vary considerably with respect to their habitat preferences
  - greatly in saltiness