Friends of the Upper Mississippi

2021 marks the 150th anniversary of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. From its origins in fisheries conservation in 1871, there have been tremendous changes in the Upper Mississippi River. But for freshwater mussels, the need remains the same; populations of species and communities of them that are resilient to change and local impacts. This isn’t to say that the historic harvest, hydrologic change, pollution, and invasive species introductions in the interim haven’t caused declines, extirpations (when a species is eliminated from an area, but not caused to go extinct), and the need for protection and management at the state and federal level, but that our objectives are the same. What does resilient mean from an environmental perspective? Perhaps it’s best to think of species as ships. Some are able to withstand a hurricane at sea or the crossing of the Drake Passage to Antarctica while even the unsinkable Titanic failed to cross the North Atlantic. The most resilient species have large enough numbers to withstand failures in reproduction, the loss of portions of their populations, genetic diversity for future adaptation to their environment, so we must find ways to recognize and protect this resilience even in our common species to maintain the resilience of their communities and ecosystems and the biosphere.
What does resilient mean for populations and communities of freshwater mussels? It’s a complex question and one we don’t have specific parameters for most species, much less most communities. This year at the hatchery we’ve completed two surveys as further steps in identifying characteristics of resilient populations. One on the Chippewa River where two federally endangered mussel species, the Winged Mapleleaf and the Higgins Eye pearlymussel were reintroduced and one at Guttenberg, IA on the Mississippi River where a train derailment occurred in 2008. Each survey’s data represents a different portion of the web of resilience.

Hatchery reared and reintroduced Higgins Eye found during the Chippewa River survey. Photo Credit: Megan Bradley/ USFWS

For the reintroduction on the Chippewa, a formula was used to calculate persistence of a number of mussels for release based on an estimated chance of survival, the area, and the percent of the community we wanted them to represent, based on other freshwater mussel communities where they’re found. Our survey shows that our estimate of survival over five years was very conservative and there are likely many more Higgins Eye still persisting in the population than we’d predicted. This data helps us refine what mortality and survivorship might look like for this species since all of the Higgins Eye pearlymussels found in the area were placed there. The Guttenberg survey looks at the response of what was likely an old, stable freshwater mussel community to an acute event, or the proverbial cannonball from on high. This year’s survey shows that mussel densities have rebounded to those at the time just after the event with support from reintroduction efforts from the hatchery and that subadult mussels added to the site have survived and grown.
These efforts, while small in the larger scope of freshwater mussel conservation, might play a role in understanding what it means for a mussel species or community to be resilient in the future while furthering individual species recovery in the Chippewa and Mississippi rivers. Every mussel recovered from a cage, tagged, or placed in the rivers by our volunteers and biologists are subtly shaping the science of freshwater mussel recovery and that that’s some pretty significant change from some pretty tiny mussels.
By: Megan Bradley

White suckers inoculated with Rock Pocketbook mussels are housed in an AHAB system- a series of flow-through aquariums that allow easy collection of juvenile mussels after they have transformed and dropped of the fish’s gills. Photo: Beth Glidewell/USFWS.

A pair of hatchery reared and released Higgins Eye found in the Guttenberg mussel survey. Photo: Megan Bradley/USFWS.

Genoa Fish Hatchery relies on volunteers and friends members to accomplish the task of tagging our lake sturgeon. Each sturgeon before stocking is individually tagged by a coded wire tagging machine. This allows biologist to track growth and survival rates after stocking.

Anyone interested in tagging please contact Erica Rasmussen or Darla Wenger (phone: 608-689-2605) or email erica_rasmussen@fws.gov or darla_wenger@fws.gov. Your help and support for fisheries conservation is much appreciated! Get a chance to hold many of these ancient sturgeon. We will be tagging Monday-Friday from 8 AM-3 PM, starting August 9th and usually lasting until beginning of October or until all sturgeon have been tagged.

Reserve your seat now! Before all the sturgeon are tagged.

By: Orey Eckes

Volunteers: Kathy (pictured left) and Rosie (pictured right) tag sturgeon by Raena Parsons/USFWS

Dairyland Power Cooperative has been a valued partner in conservation with the fish hatchery for the past several decades. Their commitment to our conservation mission manifested itself recently by supplying an accessible fishing dock to one of our ponds in order to hold targeted fishing events and supplying a peregrine falcon display in our newly added Interpretive Center. The exhibit highlights their conservation work with this species. Recently during a scheduled Dairyland employee tour of the new Center, it was suggested that there was also an interesting bit of local history that would add to the Centers mission of pointing out local stories of historical interest. In fact, two topics emerged that really piqued our interest to use the Center to point out historical and conservation stories of the area. The first was to capture the story of the construction and final disposition of the Genoa’s prototype LaCrosse boiling water nuclear reactor, the first in the nation.

This pictorial story was compiled by Dana Bolwerk, Communications Specialist for Dairyland. The exhibit is currently in the local history wing in the Center. The next addition was to add a live camera feed of nesting adult peregrine falcons on the smokestack chimney of Dairyland’s Alma Wisconsin Power Plant. The nest and its two adults fledged 4 birds this year alone. During the off nesting periods the story of Dairyland’s Peregrine Falcon restoration efforts are described in a PowerPoint Display. We could not have added this exhibit without the help of Dairyland’s Environmental Biologist Ben Campbell and IT Specialist Mark Abitz.

We are very pleased with the addition of these fascinating local stories and feel that they truly help the Great River Road traveler understand the intrinsic history and conservation stories of the Upper Mississippi River region. Please come in and check them out! By: Doug Aloisi

The Hine’s Emerald Dragonfly eggs that GNFH has been housing since the end of December have all hatched. The eggs were held at 39-41 degrees over the winter and, in early April as the outside temperatures began to rise, we began warming the eggs. By end of April they had warmed to 60 degrees, and almost 1000 larvae had hatched. Egg cups were checked every day, and the day’s newly hatched larvae were placed in small specimen cups of pond water with a few zooplankton items as food.
These juveniles were then distributed into small rearing cups either individually or in groups of two or three individuals per cup. These cups, kept in groups by maternal line, are being housed at 60 degrees and fed three times a week by pipetting pond water with concentrated zooplankton filtered out of the pond water that comes through the mussel building. Food water is checked for larger pests that will view the dragonflies themselves as food (for example chironomids, some species are predatory). The remaining copepods, ostracods, cladocerans, and an early April bloom of rotifers- which appear to be a preferred food for new instar larvae- are available for the little dragonflies to hunt as prey.
After the larvae grow past their first few instars in these protected cups, they’ll move up to the next stage- small pvc and mesh cages submerged in a larger volume of water, with more food available. Individuals have to have grown large enough to stay enclosed in mesh with 500-micron openings—this size is large enough to allow water flow to bring in oxygen and new food items in without clogging too quickly the our productive pond water with algae and detritus. The photos below (bottom row) show an early and later instar juvenile on this screen as a check to see if this mesh size will contain the individual (answers: not yet, and yeah, definitely!).
By: Beth Glidewell

A three week old and 5 month old dragonfly larva on the same size mesh screen. Photos: Beth Glidewell/USFWS.