Hello!
Welcome back to the Namekagon River Visitor Center.
My name is Ranger Nicky and today we're taking a look at one of my favorite exhibits here.
The reason this exhibit is one of my favorites is because it gives us a chance to look under
the water and see everything that's living in the river.
We're going to take a look at the river's biodiversity today.
Biodiversity is a big word for lots of different life all living together.
So, let's check it out!
Take a look at what you see as I pan across this exhibit.
Notice the different animals you can find.
Some of them have really good camouflage and are hard to see.
See what you can pick out.
Did you see any animals?
Did you recognize any?
The first animal I notice when I look at this display is the big fish in the back.
That fish is called a sturgeon.
There are two easy ways to identify a sturgeon.
The first easy way to identify a sturgeon is by how big it is.
Sturgeon can grow to be five and a half feet long.
If you stand it up, that's as tall as Ranger Sam, maybe even taller than you!
The second easy way to identify a sturgeon are the four whiskers on the bottom side of
it's snout.
These whiskers are called barbels.
They're just like a whisker you'd find on your cat or dog, but a little bit thicker.
They help the sturgeon sense for food on the river bottom.
Some of the other animals I notice are more fish.
You can see one there, there's a big small mouth bass in the back.
There are some little water bugs you might have seen on the grass.
Another really important animal in our rivers are mussels.
Mussels are an animal with a soft body protected by two hard shells.
There are forty native species of mussels in the Riverway.
As you can see The Namekagon River is full of different animals all living together.
Something we call biodiversity.
Next time you're visiting the park, take a look around.
Look at the water, look in the sky, look on land.
See if you can find biodiversity in other areas of the park.