July 21st snorkel

It's been really hard to sample this year due to high water and snorkeling has been out of the question locally. The water was not ideal today but rain is expected for the next few days so I decided to take the day off and get in the water. I hoped to photograph fish but water was a bit turbid for that so I decided to take mussel photos instead. I thought by posting here, a few folks might want to take a closer look at these incredible creatures.


link


link
The above two photos from a Kankakee River tributary Will County
I should mention that Flickr requires I link back or I'll violate T.O.S. I'm not sure why but I'll follow the rules.

The below are from the Kankakee River Will County. I have an idea on some of the ID's but I'd just be guessing so I'll leave that to more experienced people.


link


link


link

link


link


link


link


link

http://farm3.static....71f056b.jpg?v=0
link

http://farm3.static....pg?v=1248229991
link

http://farm4.static....d99a04d.jpg?v=0
link

I took a video of the lure here....I hope the link works http://www.flickr.co...in/photostream/

I had a great time and hope to snorkel more this year.

Those photos and video are great. The Kankakee is a great place and its mussel life is impressive (especially for Illinois!).

Blake

Edited by blakemarkwell, 21 July 2009 - 10:40 PM.

Uland that is freakin awesome....nuff said!

Uland,

Is the crayfish Orconectes propinquus?

Thanks Blake and Mark..I hope the three of us have water conditions that allow all of us to snorkel the kank and others this year.

centrarchid, I'm not sure but O. propinquus are present nearby.

These are great Uland.

ID'ing unionids is a skill. ID'ing unionids from siphons is a craft, and an alchemic one at that. If you really want to know in the future, pop 'em out and get a shot of the shell from the side, and place them back in the way they came out. That'll eliminate a lot of potentials.

The only one I can positively say is the plain pocketbook female you tracked in her siren call. Wow are they frilly there!

I'm pretty sure the orange and black mottled guys are pimpleback.

I would LOVE to know what the 3rd one after the spiny softshell turtle was.

If you'd like to speculate yourself, you might check out m'man Jeffro's new book. I dunno if EPA released this yet or not, or they put this up here for review, but Google found it, it says November 2008, and I hope you guys find it useful.

http://www.epa.gov/b...oindicators.pdf (3.5 mb)

I'm a little sad that they were required to put their one-size-fits-all brand on it. This is only a smoldering bureaucratic shell of its former glory, the way he envisioned it. Man, was it sexy. The information tho, is the same, and I'm so glad they funded the production of this document.

Regardless, great stuff as always Uland.

Todd

Thanks Todd. That PDF is pretty darn cool, thanks for the link.
As far as the third mussel down from the spiny...I see them every year and I know I've observed them with Stephanie. Perhaps she might be able to help.
I should add that underwater photography is really difficult. I will require a whole lot more practice before I'm happy, oh yeah a new camera might help

Stills are cake. It's film that'll drive you insane

Todd

Uland,

Those are some great photos! Nice job!

Todd,

Jeff's paper is really neat and looks very well done! I don't have time to read it all now, but have saved it for future reference. Neat!

Brian

I'll throw a wild guess out there but many of the lures and appetures from the 4th below the turtle down look like what I've seen of Actinonaias ligamentina. Third down looks like a ligamentina, an overly frilly V. iris, and maaaaybe P. sintoxia. Has that PDF changed? Definately not what I remeber downloading when it was a draft and had the same picture existing in multiple locations, both of which I've been too! That auto speller is to blame for the Quadrula cylindirca cylindrical...you don't know how many times I've found implicate instead of implicata in a document.

Edited by ashtonmj, 11 August 2009 - 08:06 PM.

Uland, those are awesome pics. Looks like a freshwater reef down there.

What kind of UW camera do you use. After my 1st snorkel experience, I'm looking into getting a 'starter' UW cam.