Did you know the Hauraki Gulf used to be completely covered with mussels that filtered the water clear? Unfortunately humans stripped all the mussel beds destroying ecosystems and leaving the water murky. We wondered what could be done to fix this.
It was so fun to dissect the kutai and identitfy the parts. A mussel dinner will never be the same again! Did you know they have a foot? And the beardy bits are actually called byssal threads? They're the part that attaches the mussel to the rocks.
We found some surprise crabs in our mussels and did further research about them. They're called pea crabs. They use that mussel as a place to live and eat its food. Some of the crabs had eggs.
Valentina said its the most fun thing she's done in Enviro so far.
We wonder if we'll find mussels on our MM2 field trip ...
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