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On a warm October day in 1984, Vince Schneider waded through the Jacob Fork River in South Mountains State Park \u2014 his attention captured by a bright red hue darting across the riverbed. Intrigued, Schneider, a curator of paleontology at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, caught up with the clawed creature and plucked it from the water, observing its brilliant blue tailfin fringed with vibrant red.<\/p>\n
It was unlike any other crayfish known to inhabit the region at that time \u2014 and this particular specimen was not alone, joined in the water by other pops of color sifting through the stones and silt at Schneider\u2019s feet.<\/p>\n
Schneider jarred the specimen and brought it back to his colleague, the late John Cooper, a research curator of crustaceans at the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was just their standard protocol: Capture unique specimens, throw it in a jar and give it to John Cooper,\u201d said Michael Perkins, an aquatic wildlife diversity biologist for the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission. \u201cJohn made notes about this species in his files, and more specimens were collected throughout the \u201880s, \u201890s and 2000s\u201d \u2014 found only in the Jacob Fork and Henry Fork rivers \u2014 \u201cbut no one really knew what this crayfish was and how it fit in to the bigger picture in North Carolina.\u201d<\/p>\n
That is, Perkins said, until the \u201ccrayfish nerds\u201d caught on to the discovery \u2014 and pushed to solve this decades-long mystery. \u201cThe thing that jumped out to us was the coloration, particularly around the tail or tailfin,\u201d Perkins said, adding that he was first introduced to the crayfish in 2017 by N.C. Wildlife colleague William T. Russ.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s this blue shade fringed with bright red that\u2019s not common in any of the other species that co-occur in these waters \u2014 or really in the entire western part of the state.\u201d Of course, he added, there were other things too: The shape of the claws, the number of spines around the hepatic region, patterns of spination and other much more subtle characteristics.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe collected a couple of these weird things, and it was clear that these were definitely not the usual flavor of species that we find around here,\u201d Perkins said.<\/p>\n
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In February 2019, the new crayfish species received its official name, Cambarus franklini<\/em>, or the South Mountains crayfish, in a scientific article authored by Perkins, Russ and N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences Research Curator Bronwyn Williams. Now, Perkins and his colleagues have begun the process of protecting this rare and hyper-localized species, which lives in two distinct and unconnected populations in the Jacob Fork and Henry Fork rivers.<\/p>\n With the inclusion of Cambarus franklini<\/em>, 46 species of crayfish have been identified in North Carolina. But about a quarter of them \u2014 maybe 15-20 species, Perkins estimates \u2014 have yet to be described.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re a well-known global aquatic biodiversity hot spot,\u201d Perkins explained, referencing in particular an abundance of fish, mussel and crayfish species. \u201cAnd we\u2019re still in the process of figuring out just how many species there are, because so many are still out there, undescribed.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the really exciting thing,\u201d he continued. \u201cWe\u2019ve begun this statewide inventory, basically taking a genetic sample of every specimen. And, as we hone in on all these different species, we\u2019ll start to uncover this hidden biodiversity in North Carolina.\u201d<\/p>\n Though they may be small and relatively unassuming, crayfish play an important role in the ecosystem \u2014 upcycling nutrients, breaking down leaf litter and preventing the buildup of harmful nitrates by burrowing and stirring up sediment. This makes these species\u2019 formal discovery and ensuing protection invaluable when looking at aquatic resource conservation as a whole.<\/p>\n \u201cComing from a conservationist point of view, there\u2019s a lot of intrinsic value in biodiversity,\u201d Perkins said. \u201cThe South Mountains crayfish is something that you can\u2019t find anywhere else in the world, and I think that\u2019s worth protecting and cherishing.\u201d<\/p>\n