18 MUSSELS OF CEE^TKAL AND NORTHERN MINNESOTA. 



QUALITY OF SHELLS. 



The Lampsilis or mucket group are the only mussels in this drainage 

 that possess any commercial value. While the pocketbook does not 

 attain the size or the quality of those found in the Shell River, and 

 the fat mucket is not as thick at those found in Snake River and Pokeg- 

 ama Lake, yet on the whole the shells are of medium size and good 

 quality. They are very plentiful in many places; at the outlet of 

 Lake Bemidji 3 tons were obtained in one week from a space only 

 a few rods in length. These mussels are like those in the Shell River, 

 in that they are buried deep. The man who collected them told us 

 that he dug down into the sandy bottom 2 and 3 feet for them and 

 found them nearly as thick as they could lie. 



The shells were remarkable for the small size of the cardinal teeth, 

 indeed a few valves were found entirely destitute of teeth. 



Another excellent locality is up the Mississippi above Lake Irving. 

 The conditions here are excellent and several carloads of shells could 

 easily be obtained. The Schoolcraft River comes into the Mississippi 

 here from Lakes Marquette and Plantagenet and both the river and 

 the lakes are reported to be full of good mussels. 



The black sand-shells throughout this portion of the Mississippi 

 have the hinge margin very strongly curved like those already de- 

 scribed from the Red River and the Crow Wing drainage. 



The fat muckets here are not thickened like the shells from Pokeg- 

 ama Lake, Pine County, and many of them are dwarfed after the 

 manner of ordinary lake shells. In addition, those from Wolf Lake 

 proved to be chalky and brittle when tested for button making, but 

 those above Lake Bemidji were of medium size and furnished good 

 button material. 



The Anodontas form but a very small percentage of the mussel 

 fauna, nearly all the shells seen being some form of Lampsilis. The 

 rcLussels in this region would all be obtained with a fork or a rake ; 

 there is no locality where the water is deep enough to use a crowfoot 

 dredge. 



PEARLS. 



Quite a number of pearls and slugs have been obtained by pro- 

 fessional pearlers, especially in the region about Bemidji. One beauti- 

 fully colored pearl as large as a hazelnut had been purchased by a 

 firm of jewelers in Bemidji just before our arrival there and was 

 valued at $200. It weighed 21 grains, but had a slight blemish on 

 one side. Some pearling has also been done in the Mississippi below 

 the power dam, which is situated 11 miles down the river from Lake 

 Bemidji. One pearl found here in July, 1912, was valued at $300. 

 There was also a display of pearls and slugs and manufactured 



