bartholomewkelly
Mollusks and Arthropods
This photo was taken February 12, 2017 at the south end of Wrightsville Beach. I took this photo on a jetty, where I found these arthropods and mollusks. A jetty is a manmade structure which serves a very important ecological purpose on coastlines; they are long, narrow structures which serve to protect the shore from erosion due to tides, waves, and currents. They can be made of different substances such as stone or wood, this one appeared to be made of stone. I was interested in this picture because I had never seen mussels in person and instantly thought of zebra mussels which are known to be an invasive species. Zebra mussels are native to water bodies in Russia and have been an invasive species in North America where they have completely covered substrates they were attached to and damaged them. They have completely covered other species of mussels to the point they cannot survive and have even clogged water pipes which their free-swimming larvae form can easily enter and grow to be extremely dense. Invasive species are species which are not native to the area and are likely to cause economic damage, environmental damage, or damage to human health upon introduction. These mussels however were missing the characteristic stripes of zebra mussels and instead were little black mussels, musculus niger, which are native to North Carolina. Little black mussels range from North Carolina to as far south as the Arctic Ocean and are also found in Greenland and Britain. Their shells are oval-shaped, thin, and smooth in the center with ridges on the outer portion of the shell. These guys are filter feeders and most likely get food in the high tide when the jetty is completely submerged. Their color can range from brown to black and many different shades are present in this picture. The barnacles seen around them in this picture are rough barnacles, Balanus balanus, which often cluster on hard, rocky surfaces, are very small, and are normally grayish in color. These barnacles had very sharp shells, they even cut up my foot a little bit. These barnacles, like the mussels, are filter feeders. Perhaps there is some interspecific competition taking place here between these two for filter food and space on the jetty.
Mollusks and Arthropods
This photo was taken February 12, 2017 at the south end of Wrightsville Beach. I took this photo on a jetty, where I found these arthropods and mollusks. A jetty is a manmade structure which serves a very important ecological purpose on coastlines; they are long, narrow structures which serve to protect the shore from erosion due to tides, waves, and currents. They can be made of different substances such as stone or wood, this one appeared to be made of stone. I was interested in this picture because I had never seen mussels in person and instantly thought of zebra mussels which are known to be an invasive species. Zebra mussels are native to water bodies in Russia and have been an invasive species in North America where they have completely covered substrates they were attached to and damaged them. They have completely covered other species of mussels to the point they cannot survive and have even clogged water pipes which their free-swimming larvae form can easily enter and grow to be extremely dense. Invasive species are species which are not native to the area and are likely to cause economic damage, environmental damage, or damage to human health upon introduction. These mussels however were missing the characteristic stripes of zebra mussels and instead were little black mussels, musculus niger, which are native to North Carolina. Little black mussels range from North Carolina to as far south as the Arctic Ocean and are also found in Greenland and Britain. Their shells are oval-shaped, thin, and smooth in the center with ridges on the outer portion of the shell. These guys are filter feeders and most likely get food in the high tide when the jetty is completely submerged. Their color can range from brown to black and many different shades are present in this picture. The barnacles seen around them in this picture are rough barnacles, Balanus balanus, which often cluster on hard, rocky surfaces, are very small, and are normally grayish in color. These barnacles had very sharp shells, they even cut up my foot a little bit. These barnacles, like the mussels, are filter feeders. Perhaps there is some interspecific competition taking place here between these two for filter food and space on the jetty.