A Habitat and a Parasite: Adult and Larval Parasitic Freshwater Mussels Impact Habitat Choice and Predator-Prey Interactions of a Host Fish and Its Prey.

ABSTRACT: Parasitic freshwater mussels are endangered ecosystem engineers with an array of impacts on multiple trophic levels and life stages. While the impacts of adult mussels on separate trophic levels have been studied, few have directly tested how adult mussels can impact trophic interactions, or investigated the impacts of the parasitic mussel larvae (glochidia) on such interactions. We present a laboratory study which mimics two-stream substrates for the endangered thick-shelled river mussel (Unio crassus): one dominated by gravel and one by cobbles. First, the preference of a gammarid (Gammarus pulex) for mussel-dominated habitats was tested in the presence/absence of chemical cues from the predator bullhead (Cottus gobio). Second, the preference of bullhead for mussel-d

SUBMITTER: Rock SL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12678866 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature