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Tuesday, May 27, 2008
300
Home range, horizontal migration, and spatial patterns of the freshwater mussel, Villosa iris
Allison M. Asher, Environmental Sciences Program, Arkansas State University, P.O. Box 847, State University, AR 72467 and Alan D. Christian, Department of Biological Sciences, Arkansas State University, P.O. Box 599, State University, AR 72467.
The goals of this study were to determine home range, horizontal migration and spatial patterns for Villosa iris. Villosa iris brood glochidia from August to May, leaving June and July as the spawning period. A mark and recapture study was conducted from May to September 2007 at the South Fork (SF) and Spring (SR) rivers in north central Arkansas. We determined the home range to be 29.3±3.5 cm2 and 43.0±10.6 cm2 for SF and SR, respectively. Average migration rate and displacement for SF mussels were 2.1 cm/day and 2.0cm/day, respectively. For SR mussels, both average migration and displacement were the same at 2.6 cm/day. Within the SF, significantly more males were upstream of females during May and more males were upstream non-gravid females during June and July, when more non-gravid females were present. By September, more males were found downstream of gravid females. In the SR, more males were upstream of non-gravid females during June and July. During August more males were downstream of females. The opposite was observed during September, with more males found upstream of females. Male and female spatial patterns corresponded with spawning patterns, as more males were found upstream of non-gravid females during the spawning period.
Web Page: freshwater mussels, reproduction, spatial patterns
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