Elimia livescens

Invasion History

First Non-native North American Tidal Record: 1872
First Non-native West Coast Tidal Record:
First Non-native East/Gulf Coast Tidal Record: 1872

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General Invasion History:

Elimia livescens is a small freshwater snail native to the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence and upper Mississippi basins, from Wisconsin and Iowa to western Quebec and West Virginia (Dazo 1965; Pyron et al. 2008). It is believed to have colonized the Mohawk and upper Hudson Rivers through the Erie Canal (Strayer 1987; Mills et al. 1997).

North American Invasion History:

Invasion History on the East Coast:

The first tidal record for Elimia livescens occurred in the Mohawk River, New York in 1872 (Lewis 1872, cited by Strayer 1987). In 1985, Strayer (1987) found E. livescens at sites along the Mohawk River to Albany, and as far downriver as Kingston, New York (NY) in the Hudson River. It was most abundant in the vicinity of Troy and Albany, NY (Strayer 1987). No specimens of this snail were collected in a 2008 survey (Coote and Strayer 2009), but this snail may have been missed or overlooked.

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Description

Elimia livescens is a small freshwater snail. The shell is conical to oval, and dextrally coiled with a sharp-pointed spire, but with an oval bulge around the body whorl. Adult shell shape is somewhat variable in a number of traits including, the length of the spire, whether it is tightly or loosely coiled, and varying width from wide to slender. Adult shells have 7-9 whorls. Younger shells have strong keels (carinae) on their whorls, but these may be eroded in older shells. In some populations, the tip of the spire and the early whorls may be eroded, too. The color of shells varies greatly from blue-gray to dark or light brown, black, greenish light-yellow or tan. The size of adult shells ranges from 14 to 22 mm in Michigan populations (Dazo 1965).

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Taxonomy

Ecology

General:

Elimia livescens is a small freshwater snail. Sexes are separate and lab-reared snails (at 22-23°C) mature at ~7 mm and ~18 months. Eggs are laid singly or in groups of 2-3, on hard surfaces, in spring through summer. Development is direct and eggs hatch into miniature snails in about 15 days at 22°C (Dazo 1965).

In its native Midwestern range, E. livescens is known from a variety of habitats including lakes, ponds, rivers, and on substrates ranging from mud and sand to rock, both with and without aquatic vegetation and woody debris (Dazo 1965; Pyron et al. 2008). In the Hudson basin, E. livescens was collected only in the Hudson and Mohawk Rivers (Strayer 1987). This snail is not known from brackish water and appears to be intolerant of pH levels below 7.8 (Dazo 1965). As a group, Pleurocerid snails are associated with clean, well-oxygenated water (Dazo 1965; Harman 1968). Its food consists of green algae and diatoms scraped off substrates by the radula (Dazo 1965).

Food:

Attached green algae and diatoms

Consumers:

fishes, crayfish, ducks

Competitors:

other snails, Bithynia tentaculata

Trophic Status:

Herbivore

Herb

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Habitats

General Habitat	Nontidal Freshwater	None
General Habitat	Fresh (nontidal) Marsh	None
General Habitat	Grass Bed	None
General Habitat	Coarse Woody Debris	None
General Habitat	Unstructured Bottom	None
General Habitat	Rocky	None
Salinity Range	Limnetic	0-0.5 PSU
Tidal Range	Subtidal	None
Vertical Habitat	Epibenthic	None

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Tolerances and Life History Parameters

Minimum Temperature (ºC)	0	Surviving under ice, under rocks or buried in organic matter (DaZo 1965)
Maximum Temperature (ºC)	27	Field, Michigan (Dazo 1965)
Minimum Salinity (‰)	0	None
Minimum pH	7.6	None
Maximum pH	8.8	Field, Michigan (Dazo 1965)
Minimum Length (mm)	7	Lab raised, 1st egg laying
Maximum Length (mm)	22	Lake Erie (Dazo 1965)
Broad Temperature Range	None	Cold temperate
Broad Salinity Range	None	Limnetic-Tidal Limnetic

General Impacts

No impacts have been reported from the invasion of Elimia livescens into the upper Hudson River, New York (NY). However, interactions with the native E. virginica are possible. Along the shore of Lake Ontario, NY in several streams, where E. livescens is native and E. virginica is introduced, hybrids between the two species were very abundant (Levri et al. 2012).

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References

Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 2002-2024a Malacology Collection Search. <missing URL>



Coote, Thomas W.; Strayer, David W. (2009) Final Reports of the Tibor T. Polgar Fellowship Program, Section IV: Hudson River Foundation, <missing place>. Pp. 1-32

Dazo, Bonifacio Capili (1965) The morphology and natural history of Pleurocera acuta and Goniobasis livescens (Gastropoda: Cerithacea: Pleuroceridae), Malacologia 3(1): 1-80

Dillon, R. T. Jr.; Watson, B.T.; Stewart, T. W.; Reeves, W. K. 2006-2024 The freshwater gastropods of North America. https://www.fwgna.org/



Harman, Willard N. (1968a) Replacement of pleurocerids by Bithynia in polluted waters of Central New York, Nautilus 81(3): 77-83

Jokinen, Eileen H. (1992) The freshwater snails (Mollusca: Gastropoda) of New York State, New York State Museum Bulletin 482: 1-89

Krieger, Kenneth A. (1985) Snail distributions in Lake Erie: the influence of anoxia in the southern central basin nearshore zone., Ohio Journal of Science 85: 230-234

Levri, Edward P.; Colledge, Elissa D.; Bilka, Rachel H.; Smith, Brittany J. (2012) The distribution of the invasive New Zealand mud snail (Potamopyrgus antipodarum) in streams in the Lake Ontario and Lake Erie watersheds, Bioinvasion Records 1: in press

Mills, Edward L.; Leach, Joseph H.; Carlton, James T.; Secor, Carol L. (1993) Exotic species in the Great Lakes: a history of biotic crises and anthropogenic introductions., Journal of Great Lakes Research 19(1): 1-54

Mills, Edward L.; Scheuerell, Mark D.; Carlton, James T.; Strayer, David (1997) Biological invasions in the Hudson River: an inventory and historical analysis., New York State Museum Circular 57: 1-51

O' Foighil, D.; Lee, T.; Campbell, D. C.; Clark, S. A. (2009) All voucher specimens are not created equal: a cautionary tale involving North American pleurocerid gastropods, Journal of Molluscan Studies 75: 305-306

Pyron, Mark; Beugly, Jayson; Martin, Erika; Spielman, Matthew S (2008) Conservation of the freshwater gastropods of Indiana: Historic and current distributions., American Malacological Bulletin 28: 137-151

Strayer, David (1987) Ecology and zoogeography of the freshwater mollusks of the Hudson River Basin, Malacological Review 20: 1-68

Strong, Ellen E. (2005) A morphological reanalysis of Pleurocera acuta Rafinesque, 1831, and Elima livescens (Menke, 1830) (Gastropoda: Cerithioidea: Pleuroceridae), Nautilus 119(4): 119-132

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