Quagga mussel

Common card · No. 391426

The quagga mussel (Dreissena bugensis) is a species of freshwater mussel, an aquatic bivalve mollusc in the family Dreissenidae. It has a lifespan of 3 to 5 years. It has sometimes been treated as a subspecies of the otherwise fossil species Dreissena rostriformis, as Dreissena rostriformis bugensis, but is currently accepted as a distinct species. The species is indigenous to the Dnipro River drainage of Ukraine, and is named by analogy with the closely related zebra mussel after the quagga, an extinct subspecies of African zebra, possibly because, like the quagga, its 'zebra stripes' fade out towards the ventral side. The quagga mussel is currently of major concern as an invasive species where it has spread in the rivers and lakes of Europe and also in the Great Lakes of North America, where it was brought by overseas shipping that uses the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

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