Pleurobema perovatum

Ovate Clubshell

FWS Focus

Overview

Characteristics
Overview

Freshwater mussels serve at the base of the food web and provide a variety of ecosystem services. They filter our water for us, help stabilize the bottom of our rivers and serve as water quality indictors. Unfortunately, due to many anthropogenic affects, freshwater mussels are one of the most imperiled groups of animals in the world. The ovate clubshell, Pleurobema perovatum, is a freshwater mussel in the family Unionidae and endemic to the Mobile River Basin in Alabama and Mississippi. The ovate clubshell was listed in 1993 as endangered due to population decline, primarily due to the impoundment of riverine habitats.

Scientific Name

Pleurobema perovatum
Common Name
ovate clubshell
FWS Category
Clams
Kingdom

Location in Taxonomic Tree

Identification Numbers

TSN:

Characteristics

Characteristic category

Habitat

Characteristics
Habitat

The ovate clubshell occurs in riffles, runs, and shoals of small creeks to large rivers, usually in sand and gravel substrates.

River or Stream

A natural body of running water.

Characteristic category

Behavior

Characteristics
Behavior

Many freshwater mussels spend the majority of their life sedentary and filter feeding on the bottom of rivers and streams. Sometimes they will bury into the sediment, only revealing a small portion of their aperture, which is used for gas exchange and filter feeding. 

Characteristic category

Physical Characteristics

Characteristics
Size & Shape

The ovate clubshell is a small to medium-sized mussel reaching lengths up to 60 mm. The shell is oval to elliptical in shape, and has nearly terminal, inflated umbos. The posterior ridge is well developed, broadly rounded, and often concave. The posterior slope is produced well beyond the posterior ridge.

Color & Pattern

Periostracum color varies from yellow to dark brown, and occasionally has broad green rays that may cover most of the umbo and posterior ridge. The nacre is white to bluish white.

Characteristic category

Life Cycle

Characteristics
Life Cycle

Freshwater mussels live an interesting multi-stage life cycle which depends upon a fish host to complete. Males release sperm into the water column, to be hopefully siphoned in by the incurrent aperture of the females, where the eggs held within her gills are then fertilized. Once the fertilized eggs start to develop, the female becomes inflated, or gravid. The fertilized eggs develop into glochidia, which is the mussels larval stage. This stage requires a fish host for transformation into the juvenile stage, which sometimes requires a little coaxing by females. Glochidia are housed in packets called conglutinates and often mimic a food source of the fishes within that ecosystem to lure the fish to bite. Once the fish bites, the glochidia clamp down onto the fish, becoming encysted, and feed from the fish for several weeks until dropping off as juveniles. The host fish for glochidia of the ovate clubshell is currently unknown, but other Pleurobema spp. are known to use members of the shiner family Cyprinidae.

Reproduction

Gravid females of this species have been observed in June and July.

Characteristic category

Similar Species

Characteristics
Similar Species

Sometimes P. perovatum can resemble P. rubellum but are usually more elongate and often more rounded posteriorly.

Characteristic category

Food

Characteristics
Food

Although the diets of freshwater mussels are poorly understood, it is believed to consist of algae, and/or, bacteria. Some studies suggest that the diets of freshwater mussels may change throughout their life, with juveniles collecting organic materials from the substrate though pedal feeding and then developing the ability to filter feed during adulthood. Pedal feeding is a form of deposit feeding where the animal uses their muscular foot to bury into the sediment, collecting organic matter. Filter feeding is a process by which mussels feed off suspended organic material by pumping in water through their incurrent aperture and out through their excurrent apertures, capturing the particles and using them as food.

Geography

Characteristics
Range

The Sipsey River (Tuscaloosa, Greene, and Pickens County, Alabama) has the most robust populations (MRDMRC 2010), and is locally common at some locations in the lower Sipsey River (McCullagh et al. 2002), where recent (2016) surveys recorded densities between 0-0.2 individuals/m2 (C. Atkinson pers. comm. 2018). During a 2013-2014 survey of the Buttahatchee River drainage (Alabama and Mississippi), a total of 28 ovate clubshell were found at 13 of 35 sites (qualitative samples) and was the I 0th most encountered out of 27 total mussel species, but was only detected in 3 of 389 quadrats for a mean density of 0.03/m2 (Gangloff et al. 2015). Several juvenile Pleurobema perovatum were found at a site in Wilson Creek (Lamar County, Alabama), indicative of a healthy, reproducing population (Buntin et al. 2015). Additionally, tributary populations have been discovered in several Tombigbee River tributaries, including East Fork Tombigbee River and Bull Mountain Creek (Itawamba County, Mississippi), Trussels Creek (Greene County, Alabama), and Wilson Creek (Lamar County, Alabama) (Buntin et al. 2015); the Cahaba River tributary, Oakmulgee Creek (Dallas County, Alabama); and several Alabama River tributaries, McCalls and Sturdivant Creek (Wilcox County, Alabama) and Tallatchee Creek (Monroe County, Alabama).

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