Critically Endangered
Golf stick pearly mussel
Obovaria retusa
Golf stick pearly mussel is a bivalve in the family Unionidae (order Unionida) — Obovaria retusa, recorded as Critically Endangered.
Appearance
This mussel has a medium to large shell. The shapes of its shells can range from oval to square. The exterior of the shell (periostracum) does not have rays and has a yellow-green to brown color.
Description The ring pink mussel was first described by the French naturalist Jean-Baptise Lamarck in 1819.
Range and habitat
The ring pink mussel is found in medium to large rivers. The ring pink does not frequent habitats deeper than about one meter. Historically, the ring pink mussel was native to the Ohio River and its tributaries in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Alabama.
Some river beaches may need to be declared mussel sanctuaries. This could preserve gametes and glochidia, since it is challenging to induce natural reproduction.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
In some freshwater species, they may only spawn once in 7 years.
In crisis
By 1991 it was thought that there were about five populations remaining in Kentucky, Tennessee, and West Virginia. It is now thought to be extirpated from West Virginia, as the population there was a misidentification. If any viable populations remain, they will be located in the Green River of Kentucky.
In the ring pink mussel 1991 recovery plan, five known populations of ring pink mussels were reported. In the past 15 years, only two live ring pink individuals have been observed.
Golf stick pearly mussel is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Golf stick pearly mussel, Wikidata item Q949977. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
