Daily Devotional – August 13

Biology

Did you know that the lampsillis mussel has its own fishing lure? These mussels live in streams and lakes. When it is time to send out its larvae, it pushes part of its soft body out of its shell. This fleshy mantle mimics a little minnow – it even has “eyes.” The lure movement is also astonishingly like a live minnow, even gulping with its mouth.

When a “host fish.” a largemouth bass, comes close to the mussel and “takes the bait.” the mussel shoots a cloud of larvae into the fish’s mouth where they clamp onto its gills. Here the larvae stay for weeks sucking the blood from the host fish; finally, they drop off when they are large enough to survive as adult mussels.

How can a mussel evolve the right lure for the host fish? How can a mussel that has no eyes know what the lure needs to look like or when a bass will come to its lure? If the mussel did not shoot its larvae into the host fish, then it would go extinct. Throwing the word like “evolution” at this amazing process does not explain how it could have developed. It had to be designed to work the way it did from the beginning, or it would not work at all.

And blessed be his glorious name for ever: and let the whole earth be filled with his glory; Amen, and Amen.

~ Psalm 72:19

Source: "Pearls in Paradise" by authors Bruce Malone and Jule Von Vett

References for this devotional.