Dreissena caspia

Wesselingh, Frank, Poorten, Jan Johan ter, Kijashko, Pavel, Albrecht, Christian, Anistratenko, Olga Yu, Frolov, Pavel, Gándara, Alberto Martinez, Gittenberger, Arjan, Gogaladze, Aleksandre, Mikhail Karpinsky, Popa, Luis, Sands, Arthur F, Vandendorpe, Justine & Wilke, Thomas, 2019, Mollusc species from the Pontocaspian region - an expert opinion list, ZooKeys 827, pp. 31-124 : 55

Dreissena caspia Eichwald, 1855

*1855 Dreissena caspia Eichwald: 311-312, pl. 10, figs 19-21.

1969 Dreissena caspia (Eichw.). - Logvinenko and Starobogatov: 316-318, fig. 341(2).

1994 Dreissena caspia Eichwald, 1855. - Rosenberg and Ludyanskiy: 1482, fig. 3e, f.

2013 Dreissena caspia Eichwald, 1855. - Kijashko in Bogutskaya et al.: fig. 109.

2016 Dreissena (Dreissena) caspia caspia Eichwald, 1855. - Vinarski and Kantor: 76.

Status. Caspian endemic, probably extinct.

Type locality. Chistyi Bank and Cheleken Island, Caspian Sea, Russia.

Distribution. Caspian Sea and Aral Sea, probably extinct.

Taxonomic notes. The species is commonly subdivided into a Caspian subspecies ( D. caspia caspia) and an Aral Sea subspecies ( D. caspia pallasi Andrusov, 1897). However, syntypes of the latter illustrated in Rosenberg and Ludyanskiy (1994, fig. 3f) show a broad and keeled Dreissena that has major morphological characters in common with D. polymorpha / elata rather than D. caspia . Filippov and Riedel (2009) reported Dreissena caspia from Holocene core deposits of Aral Sea, but given the juvenile status of their material they noted they were uncertain whether it might comprise D. polymorpha . Dreissena caspia was reported alive from the remaining "small Aral Sea" by Plotnikov et al. (2016). However, this latter record concerns more likely D. polymorpha and needs confirmation. Andreeva and Andreev (2003) mentioned that this subspecies has not been found in the Aral Sea since 1989.

Conservation status. Critically endangered, possibly extinct ( von Rintelen and Van Damme 2011b).