Chapter 3 North Carolina Species
Priority Conservation Action, Examples of Focal Species or Focal Habitats • Further refine techniques and protocols and develop best management practices for captive propagation, augmentation, and reintroduction. • Research the impact of chemicals, especially pharmaceuticals, personal care products, industrial/agrochemicals, microplastics and PFAS, and their interactions to all mussel life stages (including survival, recruitment, and recovery). The selection of chemicals to test should be guided by chemical occurrence and class (representative compounds from various classes of pharmaceuticals, for example) (2015 email from T Augspurger to the authors; unreferenced) . • Evaluate the influence of suspended sediment and its associated contaminants, especially metals and microplastics, on mussels. Develop a standard test method for evaluating the quality of sediment on mussel survival, growth, and reproduction (2015 email from T Augspurger to the authors; unreferenced) .
• Investigate the interactions of pollutants and temperature (climate change), salinity (SLR), and lower dilution (altered flows) (2015 email from T Augspurger to the authors; unreferenced) .
• Support genetic studies to help improve our understanding of mussel taxonomy.
• Determine vulnerability of SGCN to help guide permit regulations and inform the need for moratoria.
• Research to improve our understanding of how mussel species, populations, and communities respond to emerging stressors, including environmental contaminants and climate change.
• Understand and characterize the role of pathogens and diseases in mussel declines.
• Use climate change models to develop predictions of the effects of altered thermal regimes on mussel communities; identify habitats that may be resilient to changing climates; explore how variability in temperature and water levels (for example, flood and droughts) affect risk of extirpation. • Investigate thermal tolerance for freshwater mussels. Research has shown that many species of mussels are already living close to their upper thermal limits, and that there are physiological and behavioral effects of climate change on mussels (Pandolfo et al. 2010; Archambault et al. 2013; Ganser et al. 2013, FMCS 2016.)
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2025 NC Wildlife Action Plan
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