Hey all, Sid here. Welcome to Week 3, where my group was at the usual spots. On Monday, we returned to Atlantic Wharf for some more cionas and a baby flatfish. For the rest of the week, we were at Boston Childrens Museum, which was incredibly hot. Thankfully, the breeze gave some relief from the humidity and extreme heat. However that heat didn't take away from the events of the week: along with finding some more cionas and a baby fish, we were able to fish up an old crab trap. This crab trap had been untied last week, and apparently every crab nearby flocked to it, resulting in 8 crabs being inside when we pulled it up.
Originally, our group had thought that the flatfish we had caught was a baby flounder. After some research however, we discovered the several different species of flatfish that exist. The name flatfish is actually a general name for 700+ species of fish, including flounder and halibut. The size for the various species has a large range, with the largest (halibuts) being over 8 feet long, and the smallest (Soles) can be up to 30 inches long. Most flatfish can be found in Europe and North America, with far fewer species being found in Europe than North America. They live on the seafloor, lying in wait for meals to swim their way. Flatfish typically eat a wide range of organisms, including shrimp, squid, crustaceans, etc. While flatfish are quite common, the halibut(the king of the bottom) is quite endangered.
In the morning when we weren't able to catch much, our group would go down to the dock and pick up some mussels to show to the kids. The mussels we would pick up were blue mussels, which usually range from 2-4 inches long, and can be found on the east and west coasts of the United States. Mussels filter phytoplankton from the water, which is how they eat. This means they are widely used to monitor both freshwater and marine environments. They are typically farmed as food for us, but overfishing is not a risk.
Thats all for this week. See you on the harbor,