### animal | mollusc | bivalve:

Oyster
* All oysters begin life as males and become females after a couple of years
  - start out life as males due to their small size
* Have Eyes.
* Many oysters change sex over the course of their lifetime.
* More oysters grow on the ones that arrived first.
* Most oysters absorb nutrients
  - appear in sea
* Most oysters come from beaches
  - oceans
  - consume phytoplankton
  - depend on beaches
* Most oysters eat algas
  - feed on microorganisms
  - find on shores
* Most oysters grow on bottoms
  - has-part muscles
* Most oysters have nice round shapes
  - thin shells
  - keep pearl
  - live for years
* Most oysters live in coasts
  - make pearl
* Most oysters occur in areas
  - bays
  - prefer water
  - provide nutrition
  - rely on muscles
* Most oysters require shells
  - seek food
  - spend their first year as a male and in their second year they usually become females
  - wear shells
* Some Oysters exhibit parental care.
* Some oysters also flourish on mangrove roots
  - appear in restaurants
* Some oysters are empty and some contain pearls
  - favored for their large size, as are Blue Points from Long Island, New York
  - hermaphrodites and theoretically can fertilize their own eggs
  - located in oceans
  - well known for their habit of generating pearls
  - avoid predators
  - carry bacteria
* Some oysters come from coasts
  - out of water
* Some oysters contain irregular pearl
  - proteins
  - die in sea
  - eat particles
  - elongate shells
  - exhibit phenomena
  - feed on plankton
  - give birth to offspring
* Some oysters go through development
  - to bays
* Some oysters grow mouths
  - on farms
  - has-part feet
* Some oysters have eyes
  - ingest plants
* Some oysters live in intertidal zones
  - lagoons
  - up to years
* Some oysters occur in environments
* Some oysters possess blood
  - liquids
  - prefer shells
  - produce pearl
* Some oysters provide filtration
  - potassium
  - receive diets
  - release eggs
* Some oysters remove harmful pollutants
  - respond to irritation
  - share environments
  - sit in places
  - stand in water
  - survive sedimentation
  - swim in oceans
* Use an oyster server or large tablespoon to serve oysters.
* also face a crunch
  - filter water as they feed, improving water quality for young fish in the shallows
* also have a positive effect on water quality as filter feeders
  - two separate sexes, males and females
* are a huge business in France, and are an important part of the country's traditional menus
  - keystone species, which means they are extremely important to the Bay s ecology
  - type of shellfish that can be eaten either cooked or raw
  - valuable source of protein, vitamins and minerals needed for good health
  - allegedly an aphrodisiac
* are also filter-feeders
  - free from the environmental toxins that sometimes lurk in larger fish
  - high in calcium, iron, and protein
  - highly sensitive to changes in water quality
  - primary consumers which obtain their energy from plants
  - tops on the long list of foods with aphrodisiac qualities
  - among the few animals that people of the world still eat alive and raw
* are an aphrodisiac
  - exception and secrete calcite
  - important part of the ecological community
  - at their best in the winter months
  - bio-indicators of an estuary
  - bivalve molluscs that are cemented to the rock by one of their two shells
  - broadcast spawners, meaning they release eggs and sperm into the water column
  - capable of spawning within their first year of life
  - dependent for their survival on ecosystem health
  - extremely fertile
  - filter feeder s
* are filter feeders that create pseudofeces which is silt bound by mucus
  - have the ability to filter and clean large amounts of water
  - tend to reflect what is in their environment
  - filter-feeding animals that can filter several liters of seawater daily
  - found throughout the world
  - good food
  - grey, but a very light grey
  - harvest in both Pacific and Atlantic oceans
  - helpings
* are high in calcium, niacin and iron, as well as a good source of protein
  - protein and iron and are very low in calories, fat, and cholesterol
  - zinc and other beneficial minerals
  - zinc, a necessary building block for testosterone
  - immobile shellfish
  - in best condition in winter and early spring
  - lighter in flavor compared with the meaty quality of shiitake mushrooms
  - moderately low in sodium
* are mollusks that produce pearls, which are, of course, very valuable
  - with two valves, the bottom one being deeper, heavier and cup-shaped
  - nature's way of improving water quality
  - nice and plump right now 'cause they're storing fat for spawning
  - of great importance to Maryland
* are one of the Bay's most important resources and historically supported a major fishery
  - richest sources of zinc from food
  - part of birds
  - prized possessions because they have the ability to form pearls
  - safer to eat today than ever in history
  - sea animals that lack a backbone
  - sequential hermaphrodites
  - shellfishs
  - sold either in the shell or shucked
* are the lungs of our coastal systems
  - only seafood tracked so extensively
  - principal bivalve shellfish harvested commercially in California
  - richest natural source of zinc
  - usually a little faster if they become toxic at all
* are very big in France
  - high in zinc
  - nourishing and easy of digestion
  - simple creatures
  - vulnerable to a wide variety of point and non-point source pollutants
  - water filterers, as they obtain food through the water
  - well adapted to the tidal changes in estuaries
* are, and ever have been, the specialite de la maison.
* attach permanently, clams burrow, as do shipworms
  - themselves to rocks or lie on the sea bottom
* become hard because.
* breathe much like fish, using both gills and mantle.
* can be temperamental when they have been out of their natural habitat for some time
  - contain several dangerous bacteria and viruses
  - grow very well in cold water if there is abundant, high-quality plankton
  - snap their shells closed with lightning speed and with the power of a vise
  - survive in freshwater for about a week before they start dying
* close shells.
  - in different color varieties such as white, yellow, pink and brown
* contain enzymes that have little effect on humans when eaten
  - zinc and other nutrients that are particularly good for the reproductive system
* contaminated with waste can cause cholera and other diseases.
* die due to tissue lysis and occlusion of hemolymph vessels.
* differ from other bivalves in having a highly irregular shell form.
* eat by filtering food from the surrounding water through their gills
  - filtering, or straining, organisms out of the water
* emerge in droves to absorb the pearl-inducing dew.
* encounter hypoxic water on a routine basis.
* feed by filtering water through their gills.
  - minute algae and other microorganisms
  - the algae, essentially cleaning the bay
* filter out all the algae and tiny particles that cloud the water.
* form a reef community that is important habitat for other benthic species
  - large reefs that provide habitat for a wide range of plants and animals
  - pearls in many different shapes, from perfect spheres to long, flat angel wing pearls
* grow rapidly and can out-compete most contaminants
  - in the upwellers, doubling their volume in the course of a day
* grown in shrimp-infested ground can sink, smother and die.
* hatch as trochophore larvae and then change to veliger larvae.
* have gills.
  - no calendar or clock to coordinate a mating time
  - separate sexes and gametes are released into the seawater
  - thick shells in order to resist being bored into
* improve water quality, which helps the whole food chain.
* includes brains
  - carapaces
  - cell membranes
  - cells
  - corpi
  - cytoplasm
  - faces
  - heads
  - nuclei
  - plasma membranes
  - sections
  - skulls
  - vacuoles
* inhabit areas of fairly constant turbidity and salinity.
* lay millions of eggs.
  - huge reefs in salt marshes
  - naturally in salt water oceans
  - on firm surfaces in brackish water
* lose moisture once they are removed from the sea.
* make pearls from lime slime on a grain of sand
  - in response to an irritant, such as a grain of sand or another object
* naturally grow in estuarine bodies of brackish water.
* need food.
* often live long enough to reproduce, but many die before reaching market size.
* open their shells at high tide.
* pack a wallop of nutritive value as well with a low trade off in calories.
* play a very important role in the estuarine ecosystem, filtering the water.
* prefer a low-energy tidal setting with regular freshwater flow from surface runoff
  - low salinity water
  - oyster shells as substrate, although they can live on any hard surface
* produce a huge number of offspring
  - by spawning
* provide a welcome habitat for commensal and competing organisms
* reach a harvestable size in South Carolina at an age of about three years
  - puberty and have the ability to reproduce after about one year
* release eggs and sperm into the water, where fertilization occurs.
* remain popular in Connecticut today.
* reproduce by broadcast spawning, in which both sperm and egg are released into the water
  - releasing sperm and eggs into the water
  - in a much different way than the regular birth process
* require clean water to produce good pearls
* settle as spat onto shells or other hard surfaces.
* sometimes make pearls, which are valuable and used to make necklaces.
* spawn from the warm weather in late spring until early fall
  - with the female releasing eggs into the water and the male releasing sperm
* suffer greatly due to their inability to be agile and move or migrate.
* then create a hard shell from the calcium in the seawater.
* typically grow up to an inch per year.
* usually grow in groups all stuck together.
+ Mollusc
  * Oysters sometimes make pearls, which are valuable and used to make necklaces. Other shells are collected for their beauty and sometimes used to make jewellery.