Title
Date
5-6-2005
Document Type
Presentation
School
Apponequet Regional High School, Lakeville, Massachusetts
Teacher
Norma McNally
Students
Michael Smith, Lucas Corey, and Jarred Paré
Description
Long Pond, because of changes in demographics over the past 20 years, is experiencing environmental stress from the presence of Eurasian Milfoil. Two herbicides, Sonar and Diquat, were applied to water in the residential area of Long Pond known as Parkhurst in order to eradicate the milfoil. Shortly after this application a report was made of dead mussels floating on the north side of Assawampset Pond. Long Pond and Assawampset Pond are connected via Snake River. There is some speculation that there is also a connection via a culvert between Parkhurst and Assawampset Pond. The Lakeville Conservation Commission wanted to determine whether the Sonar and Diquat caused a mussel kill in Assawampset Pond. Unfortunately, since no previous information existed about the population of mussels in either pond, this could not be proven. The present study gives baseline information concerning types of mussels found in both ponds. They found fewer mussel species at Parkhurst (live and dead specimens were identified). It is possible the samplers did not observe a species that was actually present or that the species does not exist anywhere on Long Pond. Students concluded that a variety of sites on Long Pond should be sampled for mussels and that further investigations should be conducted on the direct effect of herbicides on mussel populations.
Recommended Citation
Apponequet Regional High School, Lakeville, Massachusetts (2005). Mussel Mania. In Watershed Access Lab Projects. Project 29.
Available at: https://vc.bridgew.edu/wal_projects/29
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.