Mussel biology

Mussel from Galicia (Mytilus galloprovincialis) is a mollusck with a characteristic ax-shaped longitudinal, pointed and thicker at the anterior end, very sharp and long in the back. The shell is composed of two equal calcium carbonate shells, covered externally by a coating of blue-black colour, where you can see a concentric lines called striae of growth.

As regards its internal aspect, the meat is usually an orange color even that there are individuals who have a whiter color. However, these colors are more intense than those of mussels from other locations due to the exceptional conditions, quantity and quality, of the phytoplankton of the Galician estuaries.

Mussel from Galicia is food by filtration, using the phytoplankton found in the wáter of the sea. Its filtering capacity is exceptional, filtering even eight liters of water per hour.

With regard to reproduction, Mussel from Galicia is a separate sex animal. Mussels females and males cast their gametes to the sea, where fertilization occurs. The larvae produced do pelagic life for a few weeks while they complete their development, and then fixed to a substrate by byssus filaments, fiber that creates the mussel by natural secretion of a protein that hardens in contact with water.

This natural characteristic of the mussel is used by Galician mussel farmers to fix the ropes hanging from the rafts to get high quality mussels with a high meat yield and free of sand and mud.