Comparing Mussels
Staff from the Asheville Field Office have spent the summer of 2018 working with University of North Carolina-Asheville student Brittany Barker-Jones on efforts to advance conservation of the French Broad River. Brittany is one of this year’s five McCullough Fellows, a UNCA program that connects undergraduate researchers with area organizations, people, and places to work on a project in one or more of these areas: land use and conservation; urban planning; sustainable agriculture; resilience and environmental sustainability.This year’s class of McCullough fellows recently joined Service biologist Jason Mays at the Little River in North Carolina’s Transylvania County to snorkel for mussels. The students were able to see all four native mussel species found in the river – the federally-endangered Appalachian elktoe (Alasmidonta raveneliana), longsolid (Fusconaia subrotunda), creeper (Strophitus undulatus), and slippershell mussel (Alasmidonta viridis).Credit: G. Peeples/USFWS
