Freshwater aquariums and mussels, saltwater aquariums and pearl mollusks

[Caitlin]

As a lot of folk who have been around here for a while know, I am an enthusiastic promoter of the freshwater mussel. I followed Brazilian Ricardo Cunhas progress of growing fancy colored mussels in tanks for pearliculture as he first explored the idea then set up the tanks. We haven't heard from him for awhile but we would love to know his progress.

Anyway, I am also on the unios list, which is an academic listserve for biologists studying mussels in America. It is really heating up now that school has started.

Ray Kinney found a sick mussel and brought it to his aquarium to study it. The subject of the posts seems to be discovering the nature of some kind of infection
but the wods that jumped out to me were:

The mussel is still in my aquarium and is alive though not particularly
active. I found it prone on the substrate in the creek, slightly gaped,
minimally responsive to touch, it now is upright, filtering, and responsive
to touch. I intend to put it back into the creek this weekend.

So the purpose of this thread is to show that mussels living in an aquarium is already being done. If a mussel can get healthy in an aquarium, then tanks and small ponds also become possibilities for growing and caring for them. Once people learn how to care for them, I think it would be possible to care for other populations of mussels too.

I have not yet chimed in on this list, but I am sure that I would get some good responses if I were to ask how best to get started growing mussels in captivity.

I think that so many mussels are endangered we can't just go out and grab some, but determining which mussels we could grow is the next step in actually having pet mussels.

As for growing pearl mollusks in a saltwater aquarium- well why not? It just takes the right person to put the idea together. Someone who can get the mollusks, for instance.

 

[Bodecia]

The mussel is still in my aquarium and is alive though not particularly
active. I found it prone on the substrate in the creek, slightly gaped,
minimally responsive to touch, it now is upright, filtering, and responsive to touch. I intend to put it back into the creek this weekend.

Hi Caitlin,

Great post, very interesting. I am wondering if there is anyway if the said mussel could be tagged in some way. Whatever caused its' illness in the first place could still be in the creek. Fish and I believe most water and sea life have low stress levels and once stressed they can take some time to recover to full health. I am not sure there would be a safe way to mark it for later identification though.

I have not yet chimed in on this list, but I am sure that I would get some good responses if I were to ask how best to get started growing mussels in captivity

.

I for one would be very interested in knowing more about this subject. Fancy goldfish I have kept in aquariums and bred in ponds but the breeding of mussels I know nothing about as yet. I would like to try it in the future. Please let us know if you get any information on the subject. Thanks again for the interesting post.

Bodecia

 

[boo]

Thanks, Caitlin! I have been wondering for a while how your pond plans have been coming along.

 

[Caitlin]

Hi Bo and boo
My plans are in the daydream stage.
The mussel had some kind of flagellent amoeba on it that looked like mucous---or something like that. If you really want to know, please join the list and look for the post under "What is happening with ths M fulcata? and "Question for Ray"

 

[MABE BRAZIL]

hi Caitlin,
sorry about no news. I am working very hard to finish my PhD. But about raise mussels in tanks...I had some troubles with the pH (the brazilian rivers are acid), so I looke for ways of mitigation. Now i have started an experiment using crushed shells on the tank bottom. Let's see.

Regards

Ricardo