What are clams?
Clams and snails are close relatives! They belong to a group of animals called molluscs. Other molluscs include octopus, squids and cuttlefishes!

Clamming up!

• Let's take a closer look at a clam! Clams have a two-part shell. The shell is made up of two valves, hence their scientific name bivalve! Now you know a scientific word too!
  
  
• There is a hinge between the two valves. (Use a dead clam to show this). A strong adductor muscle keeps the two valves shut. Did you know that when we eat scallops, the part we eat is the adductor muscle and not the animal?
  

Clam shapes

• Let's see how many different kinds of shapes of clams we can find. How big do you think the biggest clam can get? Introduce the Giant clam.
  
  
• The shapes of clams tell us how they live. Can you guess from the shape of this clam how it lives?
  • Is it streamlined or chunky?
  • Is it smooth or ribbed?
  • Is it light or heavy?
    
    
• Clams can do much more than you think! Here's some of the things they can do:
  • Dig: burrowing bivalves
  • Creep: most small and young oysters, mussels
  • Swim: scallops, file clams.
  • Squirt: many do this, so don't put your camera infront of a clam!
  • Stick to rocks very firmly: oysters, mussels
    
    
• If you were a clam what would you eat? How would you feed? Explain how clams feed.

• The next time you eat a clam, have a closer look at it. Try to find out more about how it lives and what it eats.
  

Clams are important to the ecosystem

• Clams are part of the food chain. Can we think of some animals that might eat a clam? Some charismatic animals to highlight: otters, sting rays, moon snails.
  

• What is your favourite clam?
  
  • Do you know where it comes from? How was it caught? Was it farmed?
  • Do you know what it eats? (Here is a good time to explain red tide and other harmful algal blooms, etc and thus why they shouldn't eat wild collected clams)
    

Clam myths to dispel

• Can we open this clam to check for pearls? Although all molluscs can produce pearls, pearls used commercially come mostly from farmed and not wild bivalves. Please don't vandalise our wild clams in the vain hope of finding valuable pearls.
  
  
• Giant clams DO NOT trap divers in their shells. More about this.
  
  
• Abalones are not clams (Class Bivalvia), they are snails (Class Gastropoda).
  
  
• Clams are sometimes NOT safe to eat. Explain red tide and other harmful algal blooms, etc and thus why we shouldn't eat wild collected clams.