Tyler Hearon
Supervisory Fish Biologist and Manager at Erwin National Fish Hatchery, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, specializing in freshwater mussel conservation and trout production.
1
APPEARANCES
1
PODCASTS
Jul 15, 2026
Tyler HearonGUEST
A mussel has a really strong shell that protects its soft body inside the shell.
Tyler HearonGUEST
[ding] So besides the obvious shell, the part that you can most often see when you lift the mussel out of the stream bed is its foot.
Tyler HearonGUEST
[ding] It also has really strong adductor muscles [ding] inside the body that help hold its shell closed if it ever needs to close its shell, if there's a predator trying to get it.
Tyler HearonGUEST
[ding] Similar to a fish, it has siphons [ding], which are little tubes that pull water in and pump water out of the body, kinda like a straw that we use to drink out of a cup.
13 MINS LATER