Scuba Diving Biologists Help Endangered Mussels Reproduce in the Upper Mississippi River

Scuba diving fisheries biologists will swim to the floor of Spring Lake at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge, bearing crates containing largemouth bass and thousands of baby Higgins eye pearlymussels, in extensive efforts to restore the endangered mussel to the Mississippi River System. Biologists are directing this reproductive process that depends on a fascinating relationship between mussels and bass. Upper Mississippi River NWFRs Savanna District Office is near Thompson, Illinois, on the Illinois-Iowa border, due west of Chicago.

First identified in 1857, the Higgins eye was added to the federal endangered species list in 1976. Known as "the canary of the deep,