The Gulf region harvests about 67 percent of the nation’s pearly bivalves, making it the the largest oyster-producing region in the country. More...

[Audubonmagazine.org (May 17, 2010)]

The second largest pearl ever found is set to go under the auctioneer's hammer next week, and may fetch as much as US$400,000. Weighing 2.25 kg (5 lb), the pearl measures six inches in diameter and bears an uncanny resemblance to a human brain. The auction lot of the massive pearl will include the lower half of the giant clam (Tridacna Gigas) in which it formed in the coastal waters of the Philippines. More...

[Gizmag.com (Nov 27, 2009)]

MIT boffins are pleased to annouce that they have at last perfected a long-sought-after technology - that of the robot clam. It seems that metal shellfish able to dig themselves into the seabed will make excellent anchors for somewhat larger droid submarines. More...

[The Register (Nov 23, 2009)]

The Chilean mussel industry trusts that it can strengthen its position in the European market, given the weakness of the Galician mussel sector.

According to data furnished by ProChile — a development programme for Chilean exports dependent on the Ministry of Foreign Relations — the crisis that grips the Galician mussel sector today has generated a growth opportunity for the Chilean exporting sector.

[Fish Information & Services (Nov 4, 2009)]

THE infestation of Lough Corrib by the dreaded Zebra Mussle has cut off the water supply to homes in Headford. More...

[The Connacht Tribune (Nov 5, 2009)]

Biologists are able to determine the sources of toxins in water by using clams as pollutant traps. Clams naturally clean water by feeding absorbing toxins in their tissues as they draw in water. By placing the clams downstream of industrial parks and highways, they can be analyzed for pollutants. More...

[ScienceDaily.com (Jan 1, 2009)]

In a new study, scientists have found that ocean acidification may contribute to global shellfish decline, as elevated carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations impede growth and survival of bivalve larvae. More...

[Thaindian News (Oct 27, 2009)]

Embedded in a wedge of rock, the crenelated, petrified clam sat on Ernie Clark’s desk amid family photos for 15 years. More...

[BClocalnews.com (Oct 22, 2009)]

Out on the flats of Galway Bay, late September’s ashen clouds hang low over the gunmetal sea. Faded gray seaweed cushions the muddy, rock-strewn shore where the wind is brisk and scented with salt.

Standing in an inch of muck, a bunch of oyster shuckers are talking about knives. Not just any old knives or any old shuckers. The knife-wielding guys assembled this afternoon are the crème de la crème of competitors in the oyster-shucking universe. They’re here for the Guinness World Oyster Opening Championship, the centerpiece of the three-day party, now in its 55th year, known as the Galway International Oyster Festival. More...

[LAtimes.com (Oct 14, 2009)]

Dr. Mark Green spends his summers in the mud of Maine's coastal areas, researching the fate of larval bivalves, also called spat.

What he's found isn't encouraging. The mud in some places along Maine's coast is so acidic that spat risk dissolving if they try to settle. While that's bad news for bivalves, it provides valuable insight into what scientists can expect from ocean acidification. More...

[workingwaterfront.com (Oct 6, 2009)]

The Delaware Bay Oyster Restoration Project, an ongoing effort to revitalize Eastern oysters in Delaware Bay, was honored with a 2008 Coastal America Partnership Award on October 4 during a bayside ceremony held at the University of Delaware’s Coast Day festival in Lewes, Delaware. The Coastal America Partnership Award is the only environmental award of its kind given by the White House. More...

[DelawareOnline.com (Oct 5, 2009)]

A report from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute while they are at sea in the northeast Pacific. You can also follow the expedition at Deep-Sea News. More...

[Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (Sep 7, 2009)]

Scientists are comparing annual growth rings of the Pacific Northwest's largest bivalve and its most iconic tree for clues to how living organisms may have responded to changes in climate.

Analyzed by themselves, the rings from a single tree or mollusk may sometimes reflect conditions that are either favorable or unfavorable for growth. When scientists look at numerous individuals of the same species, however, the consistency of the ring patterns allows them to build a model and compare that to known climatic measurements.

[Oregon State University (Jul 29, 2009)]

The hard clam, Mercenaria mercenaria, has been affected by severe mortality episodes associated with the protistan parasite QPX (Quahog Parasite Unknown) for several years. Despite the commercial importance of hard clams in the United States, molecular bases of defense mechanisms in M. mercenaria, especially during QPX infection, remain unknown. More...

[7thspace.com (Aug 2009)]

Scientists say they’ve created something in a Virginia river that hasn’t been seen since the late 1800s: a vast, thriving reef of American oysters, the shellfish that helped create the Chesapeake Bay’s ecosystem and then nearly vanished from it. More...

[Washington Post (Jul 31, 2009)]

In February - March this year we where on a diving trip in the Visayas, Philippines and we have seen a creature what we don't know what it is More...

[Sea Slug Forum (Aug 11, 2008)]

Ed Seitz has enjoyed eating clams all his life, but he never thought something that could have ended up in the trash might be worth a couple thousand dollars. More...

[pressofAtlanticCity.com (Jul 29, 2009)]

Sometimes it’s just a case of being a member of the wrong family. Researchers analyzing evidence from 200 million years of fossil records have concluded that some lines of living organisms don't need a cataclysmic event to wipe them out. They just seem destined to go extinct. More...

[ScienceNOW Daily News (Aug 7, 2009)]

The enormous potential of biotechnological and genetic applications in Chilean aquaculture, specifically in molluscs breeding, was on show during the seminar “Biotechnology and Genetics as applied to Molluscs,” held in Port Montt. More...

[FIS.com (Aug 7, 2009)]

A rare “pigtoe” mussel in the Conasauga River in Georgia and Tennessee may be added to the endangered species list, and the same is proposed for an aquatic snail in the Oostanaula River, officials with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Monday. More...

[The Daily Citizen (Jun 29, 2009)]

With his head nearly buried in sand and saltwater, Victor Mizumori of Redmond was hunched over inside a custom made stainless steel canister with his hands on one of the world’s largest bivalves buried in 4 feet of sand. More...

[The Seattle Times (Jun 22, 2009)]

Jeff Hawk wanted a shot at the big clams that have been hiding all year. So by 6:30 this morning, the Talent man and his son Jesse, 12, were scouring the mudflats of the South Slough in Charleston, digging for clams and trying to take advantage of 2009’s lowest tide yet. More...

[The World (Jun 23, 2009)]

Too tiny to see or touch, manmade nanoparticles are increasingly becoming a byproduct of industry and chemical and pharmaceutical technology. But once these super small materials enter the water supply, do they reach coastal areas and enter salt marshes and tidal zones, where shellfish and finfish grow? More...

[NanoWerk.com (Jun 22, 2009)]

Hopes have been raised for the future of an endangered species following a survey which has proved that the creatures are still breeding. The rare pearl mussel is regarded as a globally endangered species with its numbers dwindling around the world. More...

[The Northern Echo (Jun 9, 2009)]

Hordes of an elegant, edible bivalve commonly known as the green mussel have traveled from their home base of the Indo-Pacific region and made their way into the Western Hemisphere. Now a number of scientists want to know how and why they have managed to invade Florida waters, what that means, and what to do about it. More...

[The Beaches Leader (Apr 23, 2009)]

One of the biggest problems for the Chesapeake Bay oyster is that too many people expect too much from the filter-feeding bivalve. More...

[Bay Journal (Apr, 2009)]

Can Lake Powell repel the invasion of the dreaded quagga mussel? The answer from federal biologists, tasked with preventing the spread of the highly destructive European bivalve, is a qualified yes. More...

[The Zonie Report (Mar 31, 2009)]

Living in the tropics — hands down — beats living at the poles. At least that’s the consensus of the high number of species crowding near the equator. More...

[msnbc.com (Apr 2, 2009)]

Ball, A. D., K. Purdy, E. A. Glover and J. D. Taylor. 2009. Ctenidial structure and three bacterial symbiont morphotypes in Anodontia (Euanodontia) ovum (Reeve, 1850) from the Great Barrier Reef, Australia (Bivalvia: Lucinidae). Journal of Molluscan Studies 75: 175-185.

Abstract:
The structure of the ctenidia of the Indo-West Pacific chemosymbiotic lucinid bivalve Anodontia(Euanodontia) ovum was investigated by electron microscopy. Ctenidial filaments are similar in general morphology to those described from other Lucinidae, with a ciliated zone, a short intermediary zone and a thick abfrontal zone composed largely of bacteriocytes separated by narrow intercalary cells. The bacteriocyte zones of adjacent filaments are fused in the distal part to form short cylindrical channels. The apices of intercalary cells project as cytoplasmic protrusions in the form of spiky tufts, with sheets and tendrils spreading over adjacent bacteriocytes. Compared with other lucinids A. ovum lacks abfrontal granule cells, mucocytes are infrequent and the bacteriocyte channels are short. Three morphotypes of symbiotic bacteria were detected, associated with the bacteriocyte zone of the ctenidial filaments: (1) all bacteriocytes contained abundant bacteria 3 – 5 mm long and 0.5 – 1.0 mm wide, enclosed in single vacuoles; (2) some bacteriocytes possessed spherical vesicles enclosing masses of smaller rod-shaped bacteria c. 1.0 mm long; (3) probable spirochaete bacteria, 8 – 10 mm long and 0.3 mm wide, were abundant within the apical cytoplasmic protrusions of the intercalary cells. Preliminary molecular analysis using 16S rRNA gene sequences has so far identified only one bacterial symbiont, from the gamma division of Proteobacteria grouping in a cluster of symbiotic thiotrophs. This symbiont of A. ovum is closely similar to a symbiont previously reported from the western Atlantic lucinid Anodontia schrammi (originally cited as A. philippiana).

Researchers in California are reporting for the first time that metals are key ingredients that give the coatings of anchoring byssal threads of marine mussels their amazing durability. More...

[ScienceDaily.com (Apr 13, 2009)]

The origin of the neurotoxin azaspiracid has finally been identified after a search for more than a decade. The azaspiracid toxin group can cause severe poisoning in human consumers of mussels after being enriched in the shellfish tissues. More...

[EurekAlert.org (Mar 24, 2009)]

Marine biologist Dave Ono sinks a gardening fork into the soft sand of Pismo Beach. He pulls up a load of sand and flings it across the beach. Out rolls a compact, yellowish sphere...It’s a Pismo clam. More...

[fresnobee.com (Mar 14, 2009)]

For more information:

• Miller, Daniel J., James E. Hardwick, and Walter A. Dahlstrom. 1975. Pismo Clams and Sea Otters. California Department of Fish and Game, Marine Resources Technical Report no. 31, 49 pp. [PDF]
• Video of Pismo clam burrowing
• The Pismo Clam (Pismo Beach Conference & Visitors Bureau)
• William C. Herrington. 1929. The Pismo Clam: Further Studies of its Life History. Scripps Institution of Oceanography Library. Fish Bulletin: 18 (March 1, 1929). [PDF]

John D. Taylor, Emily A. Glover, Suzanne T. Williams. 2009. Phylogenetic position of the bivalve family Cyrenoididae — removal from (and further dismantling of) the superfamily Lucinoidea. The Nautilus 123(1):9-13.

Abstract:
A molecular analysis using sequences from 18S and 28S rRNA genes of the brackish and freshwater bivalve Cyrenoida floridana, in conjunction with a wide range of other heterodont bivalves, demonstrated a close relationship with the families Corbiculidae and Glauconomidae and distant from the Luci noidea, where the Cyrenoididae had been usually classified. Based on this result it is proposed that the Cyrenoididae be removed from the Lucinoidea, which, for living taxa, now includes only the family Lucinidae.

All the way at the end of a narrow country road, past farms and stately old homes, sits the possible future of Maryland's flagging oyster industry. More...

[hometownannapolis.com (Mar 16, 2009)]

A tiny, shrimplike creature that's valuable to the Great Lakes food web has all but disappeared from Lake Michigan, and scientists blame the invasive quagga mussel. More...

[mlive.com (Feb 19, 2009)]

A decision on whether Asian oysters could be approved for cultivation in the Chesapeake Bay could be coming very soon — if it hasn't already been made. More...

[BaltimoreSun.com (Feb 17, 2009)]

Last weekend I had a meeting at a printing company located in the immense Shin-minato industrial district of Chiba Port. After several hours of concentrating on software versions and file links, I was ready for some serious iyashi-style relaxation and rejuvenation. Fortunately, Inage Seaside Park (Inage Kaihin Koen) sits just west of the huge industrial zone. More...

[Daily Yomiuri Online (Feb 20, 2009)]

A paper entitled Very long-lived mollusks confirm 17th Century AD Tephra-based radiocarbon reservoir ages for North Icelandic shelf waters has recently been published in the journal, Radiocarbon (2008, Vol 50(3): 399–412). One specimen of Arctica islandica, collected in 2006, was aged at more than 405 years, making it the longest-lived mollusk and possibly the oldest non-colonial animal yet documented. More...

[Radiocarbon (2008)]

It isn’t cute, like Japan’s robot dog. Or endearingly domestic, like those roboticized vacuum cleaners that beetle around the living room in pursuit of household dirt. But mariners, oil outfits, and the military have big hopes for an unlikely contraption called RoboClam under design at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. More...

[Boston.com (Dec 22, 2008)]

After 25 years perfecting the science of farm-raising clams, Cherrystone Aqua Farms wants to diversify the market with another edible bivalve — the oyster. More...

[delmarvanow.com (Dec 6, 2008)]

The future of Alabama’s mussels is as murky as the Black Warrior River. The Tennessee, the Tombigbee, the Cahaba, the Coosa, the Tallapoosa, the Alabama, the Choctawhatchee and the Chattahoochee — the great coastal plain river systems of Alabama are home to the most diverse habitat of freshwater mussels in the world. A single mussel, which can filter 12 gallons of water a day, is the bedrock of a complex ecosystem. But almost uniformly, the species are in decline. More...

[TuscaloosaNews.com (Nov 2, 2008)]

The rain abated for three short hours on Sunday, Oct. 5, just long enough for the East Hampton Town Trustees to hold their 18th Annual Largest Clam Contest. A hearty, robust showing of 39 contenders graced the judges table...Brad Hughes won the juniors category with a 1.69 lbs. clam...The largest clam in the adult competition was 2.43 lbs., dug in Napeague Harbor by William Havens, measuring 14.0 cm long and 8.1 cm wide. More...

[Hamptons.com (Oct 7, 2008)]

Shellfish gatherers should continue to be cautious of the dangers of paralytic shellfish poisoning from clams and mussels gathered on beaches across Alaska, and especially those on Kodiak Island. More...

[Kodiak Daily Mirror (Oct 3, 2008)]

Several members of the BivAToL team were recently in Moreton Bay, Australia on an intensive bivalve collection trip. From digging in the mud flats to deep-water dredging, they were trying to collect many of the species on our list that will be analyzed in our quest for the bivalve phylogenetic tree.

For more information:

• Video clips and dispatches from the field in the PRI blog
• The full story at Expeditions@Field Museum

The article discusses the discovery of a new species of Dilemma, a genus recently discovered by Dr. José Leal. Shells of this new species were found off of central Japan. This represents a significant range extension for the genus, to the Northwest Pacific. The new species is distinguished from the other three species by its surface sculpture, shape, and hinge. The new species has been named Dilemma japonicum. More...

[Island-Reporter.com (Sep 26, 2008)]

Chemical compounds contaminating water can alter the sexual development of aquatic organisms, giving rise to hermaphrodite creatures with both masculine and feminine gametes. This was the conclusion of a research team from the University of the Basque Country after analysing mussels and grey mullet in Urdaibai.. More...

[Basque Research (Sep 25, 2008)]

A peer-reviewed edited volume on the mollusks of eastern Thailand has just been published as The Raffles Bulletin of Zoology Supplement no. 18. All articles are freely available at http://rmbr.nus.edu.sg/rbz/supplement18.php. The volume resulted from the Second International Marine Bivalve Workshop, Thailand, 2005.

[Sept 9, 2008]

An extensive clam mass mortality occurred in late July 2008 at Clifton Beach, Karachi, Pakistan, in the Arabian Sea. Photos, shared via Texas A&M researchers Fabio Moretzsohn and Wes Tunnell, are posted at http://picasaweb.google.com/mollusca/KarachiPakistan. The clam appears to be some species of Veneridae but has not been fully identified. The clams apparently accumulated on top of the sand overnight; most were still alive when discovered on the beach. Tunnell has suggested that it could be a specific disease. A general problem with the water has been ruled out because no other animals were found with the clams. There was an oil spill near this particular coastline 3-4 years ago. Other suggestions on what might have caused this mass mortality are being sought; please email Mir Usman Ali at Texas A&M University ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ).

[July 2008]

Unlike clams and oysters, which we eat whole, the only part of a scallop eaten in the United States is the adductor muscle – the strong muscle that opens and closes the scallop’s shell. Some cultures, however, do indeed consume the entire animal. More...

[Zoo and Aquarium Visitor, 2008]

In the shell, clams lack the distinctiveness of the mussel and the elegance of the oyster. Outside the shell, they are perhaps too often the bland, somewhat chewy strips ubiquitously served on seafood plates. Fortunately for us, people look beyond eye appeal. The sand-burying bivalve is already an important part of coastal cuisines – from clam bakes to pasta dishes. More...

[StarNewsOnline.com (Aug 27, 2008)]

EGL USA authenticated one of the largest pearls ever to be discovered and documented. The brain-shaped specimen — a giant non-nacreous natural blister pearl — weighs an incredible five pounds (2.267 kilos) and measures some six inches in length. More...

[Rapaport News (Aug 8, 2008)]

A new species of giant clam has been discovered in the Red Sea. More...

[BBC (Aug 29, 2008)]

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued a warning to consumers against eating certain frozen cooked mussel products made by Bantry Bay Seafoods. More...

[NEWSInferno.com (Aug 18, 2008)]

Britain’s sailing squad has an extra weapon going into the Olympics — an extract from a sea creature which could help keep them ready to race.They have been using a blood test using luminous chemicals taken from the common piddock, a marine mollusc. More...

[BBC News, UK (Aug 5, 2008)]

While others head to the beach or to a boat, Rick Bushnell loads canisters of pebble-size baby clams along with seashells, fishing nets, and boxes of pamphlets, then slides into his SUV at least three mornings a week and heads to a Long Beach Island community center or waterfront park. More...

[Philly.com, Philadelphia, PA, USA (Jul 27, 2008)]

Pacific littleneck clam, or in Latin, Protothaca staminea: A familiar sight on many Georgia Strait beaches, this is the clam whose chalky white hard shell we often pick up while beachcombing. More...

[The Vancouver Sun, Vancouver, Canada (Aug 2, 2008)]

A fresh batch of 40 True Giant Clams (Tridacna gigas) have just completed the journey from rearing laboratories in Bolinao to their new homes on Santelmo Reef. More...

[WildlifeExtra.com (June 2008)]

Some folks drool over biceps on the beach, others salivate over bivalves - the edible kind of mussels. Summer is the season for grilling, shucking and having New England-style clam bakes. But before digging in, let the bivalve buyer beware. More...

[La Jolla Light, La Jolla, CA, USA (Jul 30, 2008)]

If you are among the many Western New York residents griping about the high cost of groceries, maybe you just don’t know where to shop or more importantly, what to buy. For Debbie Denmeade and Larry Catalano, a trip to the Wegman’s on McKinley Parkway in Hamburg Memorial Day weekend may have been the best decision the Lake View couple has ever made. More...

[The Sun, Hamburg, NY, USA (Aug 7, 2008)]

It’s not unusual  for Carmen Miller to grab a raw quahog fresh off the beach, shuck it open and eat it. But something out of the ordinary did happen recently when the Tatamagouche man did just that. More...

[Truro Daily News, Nova Scotia (Aug 1, 2008)]

Unchecked pollution has destroyed the coastal areas near Karachi and has also resulted in the destruction of marine life, especially oyster (Mollusks) beds, which are an important source of foreign exchange in addition to maintaining the ecological balance. More...

[The News International (July 24, 2008)]

The quagga mussel, a small bivalve not native to United States waters, has begun to colonize the Colorado River and may soon make its way to Utah. Officials from the Central Utah Water Conservancy District learned about the invasive species and how to combat its spread in a conference Tuesday in Orem, UT. More...

[Daily Herald, Provo, UT (July 16, 2008)]

North Carolina is about to throw big bucks at the humble oyster, long the poster child of what’s wrong with the coast, to try to boost stocks of the depleted bivalve.. More...

[StarNewsOnline.com - Wilmington,NC, USA (July 13, 2008)]

The fossil record seems to indicate that the diversity of marine creatures increased and decreased over hundreds of millions of years in step with predator-prey encounters, Virginia Tech geoscientists report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. More...

[ScienceDaily.com (Sep. 14, 2007)]

Diversity among the ancestors of such marine creatures as clams, sand dollars and lobsters showed only a modest rise beginning 144 million years ago with no clear trend afterwards, according to an international team of researchers. More...

[ScienceDaily.com (July 7, 2008)]

Re-seeding programmes on over 50 reefs are securing the survival of the giant clam for at least another generation, according to WWF-Philippines.

The clams, the world’s largest bivalve mollusks and the star of lurid but mostly imaginary literary and cinematic depictions of trapped divers, can live for over a century. More...

[WWF International - Gland,Switzerland]

You’ll recall the arctic quahog - a species of bivalve clam - has a maximum lifespan somewhere north of 400 years. Other bivalve species fall into the 30 to 100 year range... More...

[from Methuselah Foundation - Washington,DC,USA]

Amid the wind and rain of a stormy bayshore day, members of the Bayshore Discovery Project and other parties broke ground on a massive, multi-million dollar initiative to reconstruct an integral part of the Delaware Bay's cultural and economic history. More...

[from TheDailyJournal.com, New Jersey, USA]

U.S. environmental laws enacted in the 1970s are reducing overall contaminant levels in coastal waters of the United States, finds a 20 year study released today by scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA...The longest continuous national contaminant-monitoring program in U.S. coastal waters, the Mussel Watch program analyzes chemical and biological contaminant trends in sediment and bivalve tissue collected at over 280 coastal sites from 1986 to present. More...

[from Environment News Service - USA]

Zebra and quagga mussels are freshwater bivalve mollusks that typically have a dark and white, zebralike pattern on their shells...They pose trouble because when they are found, there usually are millions of them. More...

[from Grand Junction Sentinel - Grand Junction,CO,USA]

Mussels, the bivalve aquatic creatures, can stick to virtually any surface from metal to wood to plastic. Now their tenacious adhesive abilities have inspired a synthetic version of their glue. More...

[from Discovery Channel - USA]

Although they are called “giant,” there is a need to protect the bivalve mollusks from people who seek their meat and shell.  More...

[from Inquirer.net - Philippines]

Six members of the Bivatol Project (Rüdiger Bieler, Gonzalo Giribet, Paula Mikkelsen, Tim Collins, Ellen Strong, and Brian Gollands) attended the biennial AToL Principal Investigator meeting at the Hilton St. Charles in New Orleans, March 7-9, 2008, hosted by Hank Bart of Tulane University (Bony Fishes AToL).